Lunocracy
by tyron23
Summary: Ranma gets a friend
1. Default Chapter

Lunocracy  
  
Disclaimer: Don't own this. Not mine.  
  
Chapter 1: Aaaaaahhhh! Friend!  
  
The pit was dark and damp. The walls were mostly dirt with the odd root sticking out of them. The smell of fecies mixed with a musty smell permeated the air in the pit. The yowling of many cats and shuffling sounds could be heard. Two old toms got into a fight and bowled over a couple of the other cats that were on the ground.  
  
Luna got a rude awakening as she was bowled over by a couple of fighting cats. She slowly stood up and shook the cobwebs out of her head. When she looked around she almost added to the filth that was littering the floor of the pit. All around her were cats in various stages of starvation. Some were dead their carcasses picked clean of everything but the bones. She would have puked but her stomach was already empty.  
  
One of the cats tried to jump Luna from behind. She dodged to the left at the last minute and used her lunar guard training instinctively to render the cat unconscious. She spun around and let the moon symbol on her forehead glow. The cats that were looking at her backed off in fear. She shook her head again. Damn it. It had only been a week since she awakened from the capsule that Serenety had put her into now this happens.  
  
She racked her brain to try and figure out exactly how in the hell she got into this pit. She put her paw to her forehead. It was a bit hazy. She remembered walking through the streets of a small town. She had a mission that much she knew, it had something to do with a princess and warriors but other than that her memory was pretty much blank. She hated having a job to do and no clue how to do it. She was rooting around trying to find something to eat when she was hit in the back of the head. The last thing she saw before she blacked out was a big greasy hand reaching for her.  
  
She was brought out of her introspection by a sound coming from above. She along with all of the other cats looked up. Some of the cats looked anxious about something. Luna was starting to get worried because that kind of look was not the one that you tended to see on a domestic pet, it was the kind you saw on a wild animal that was stalking its next meal.  
  
The top of the pit slowly opened the rusty hinges creaking loudly yet to the cats in the pit it sounded like a dinner bell. The bright sunshine streamed in illuminating the dark pit. It took a couple of seconds for Luna's eyes to readjust to the new lighting conditions. Once she could see again she looked up towards the top of the pit. The top of the pit had a heavy steel door that was hinged in the middle. She couldn't see anything but blue sky above but she was able to make out a voice. It sounded like an older male that was annoyed at something.  
  
"Alright you're going in and you had better get over this stupid fear of yours. No son of mine is going to be afraid of a stupid CAT!" He yelled. There was something else that was said by somebody else but it was too low for Luna to hear over the yowling of the cats.  
  
Suddenly there was movement from the top of the pit. The cats started moving around like they were anticipating something. 'Pavlov's dogs all of them.' thought Luna as she moved to the side of the pit. If she ever got out she was going to shred that stupid man that put her in here.   
  
There was a shadow for a second as something was thrown into the pit. Immediately the cats jumped to the spot where the shadow landed. Luna thought it was strange at first that the man would bother starving them just to feed them.  
  
That was before the screaming started.   
  
Luna suddenly came to realize what was happening. The man had thrown his son into the pit for some reason. She didn't care about why he was in here; all she cared about was saving him before the cats tore him to pieces. She took off towards where he was curled up in a fetal position. She was unconsciously making use of her moon kingdom training to swat the cats away. Some of them were rendered unconscious, while others were severely injured. A few cats turned away from the boy to confront Luna.   
  
The first cat was a large grey tom cat. It hissed at her menacingly while bearing its teeth and claws. Luna just spun around and mule kicked it in the head flinging it against the far wall of the pit. The other cats that had turned to oppose her scattered at seeing their leader taken down so easily. Well that and the crescent moon symbol on her forehead was glowing like hellfire.   
  
Luna continued on towards the boy. She had been monitoring his condition ever since he first screamed. His aura was wavering erratically as the cats tore at his flesh and the fish products that were tied to him. Luna had smelled them a while ago and had guessed that was the reason the other cats were attacking with such ferocity.  
  
She had reached the boy however she was too late. Just before she could get to the first cat the boy's aura suddenly inverted. Luna skidded to a stop as all of the hairs all over her body stood up all at once. Something was horribly wrong with him. She quickly spun around and took off towards the far side of the pit away from the boy. She couldn't help him if she was dead could she.  
  
About halfway towards the edge of the pit was when the first cat skull flew past her. This only made her push her muscles well beyond what they were normally able to do.  
  
Adrenalin and magic were wonderful things when combined with mind numbing terror.  
  
When she finally hit the wall she ran about 3/4 of the way straight up before the side collapsed and buried her partially under loose dirt and gravel. She shook her head to clear most of the dirt off of it. She looked over to where the boy was. She immediately wished she hadn't looked up. Over on the other side of the pit there was a large pile of cat parts with an insane boy in the middle of them. He had a mop of what might have been black hair, but it was so coated with blood, mud, and various other things that Luna really really didn't want to think about. His face, which would have been handsome if it wasn't covered in blood and scratches, was looking around for survivors. Even in the darkness she could see his cobalt blue eyes lock onto her brown ones. She felt absolute terror more than what she'd ever felt before. (Which wasn't much since all of her memories before a week ago were smashed like an overripe melon at a sledgehammer competition.)  
  
The boy started to slowly stalk towards her like a jungle cat playing with his food before killing it. Luna noted the stance that he was in as being cat like. She remembered hunting her food and moving exactly like that.  
  
"Umm you wouldn't mind sparing me would you?" She asked with a slight shake in her voice.   
  
"Mrrrr" was the boy's only response.  
  
"I guess not." She grumbled.   
  
The boy continued to stalk forward. The surviving cats fled to the far side of the pit not minding the carcasses of their slain comrades, as they were running on pure instinct to try and flee.  
  
Luna wished she could flee but trapped under the ground like she was she didn't dare move lest he pounce. When he was almost right on top of her he raised his small hand in the air. Luna tracked its movement with her eyes. The boy didn't have claws so what the hell was he... She saw a faint red glow emerge from in-between his knuckles right where claws would be.  
  
Her day now officially sucked.  
  
As he was bringing his arm down for a decapitation swing Luna screamed and the crescent moon symbol on her forehead screamed to life. The boy hesitated in his downswing as a lance of light shot out of Luna's forehead and pierced the middle of the boy's forehead.  
  
Luna's first mind meld in over a millennia and she fucks it up badly.  
  
When the light subsided the boy slowly lowered his 'paw' and stumbled back as if he was dazed. When he stopped he stayed still for a few seconds before looking at Luna again. He let off a playful 'Miya' and bounded towards her. Before she could react he had grabbed her by the back of her neck with his teeth and pulled her out of the pile. He then jumped to the top of the pit. Luna thought that they would crash into the lid of the pit however the boy slashed at it with his 'claws' and it exploded outward pelting the fat man with shrapnel. Luna would have smiled but she was currently held in the mouth of a crazy boy like some kind of kitten as he bounded away from the pit at high speeds.  
  
Luna shut her eyes and tried to ignore the pull at the back of her neck. It hurt quite a bit. Grown cats weren't meant to be carried around this way. This continued on for about another fifteen minutes before she felt herself being placed onto what felt like a rough wooden floor. She slowly opened her eyes to look around.  
  
She was on a wooden porch of a house in the country. The rough wooden slats were grey with age and mildew. Within her field of vision she could see a rocking chair with a table beside it; both of them were grey as well. The porch was shaded by a couple of large, what appeared to be, cherry trees. Over to the side she could see an old style well. The stones were covered in a thick green and brown moss. The pulley system was broken and it was just laying across the opening of the well.  
  
She craned her head around to look behind her because she could still feel something holding her down. She was suddenly staring into a pair of slitted cobalt eyes.  
  
"Mrawr!" the crazy boy said.  
  
"I don't suppose you really understand me anymore do you?" Luna said.  
  
A rumbling purr was her only response.  
  
"I guess not." She said while trying to wiggle out of his grasp. He let her go and she was able to turn around.  
  
The boy was six maybe seven years old. He had on a brown gi or at least she thought it was brown until he moved and she was able to see a sliver of off white from the inside. She remembered briefly the scene from the pit and all of a sudden she wasn't as curious as to exactly what was on his clothes.  
  
Turning from his clothes she looked at his face. He was a little cutie or at least he would be if he was cleaned up. His face was covered in dirt, blood and a bit of fur. There were a few scratches on his face a lot less than Luna would have imagined being mauled by all of those cats. What injuries he did have seemed to be healing right in front of her eyes. That couldn't be right could it? His eyes were.... not quite right. The irises were cobalt blue but instead of a round pupil like a human would have it was slitted like a cat. She shuddered to think what had happened to make his mind snap so badly that it would manifest itself as a physical change.  
  
"You poor thing." She said as she nuzzled his cheek.  
  
She was shocked when she felt his tongue start to lick her clean. She tried to get away but a cat's strength, even a magical cat's strength, does not compare to a crazy boy that thinks he's a cat. He pinned her down and continued to clean her.  
  
Luna wished that whats his face never ever heard of this or she'd be forced to kill him.  
  
As he was finishing up she heard a creak as the front screen door opened.  
  
"Oh deary my what do you have here?" The old woman said as she knelt down in front of them.  
  
She was an elderly lady. Her face was wrinkled by the passage of time. Her long white hair almost hung down to the back of her knees. She must have been beautiful once however now she was just an old woman.  
  
She was wearing a simple housedress that had several patches on it where it had been repaired. Over the dress was an old worn apron that had obviously seen better days as well. She gave off an air of peace and tranquility.  
  
Luna guestimated that she had 25 other cats.  
  
She patted her lap and made some cooing sounds. Ranma grabbed Luna in his mouth and jumped into her lap. Luna was again unprepared for this sudden jolt and felt a sharp pain in her shoulders. She wished he would stop doing that.  
  
The old woman started stroking his head and his back as if she was petting a giant kitten. The boy started purring again which unnerved Luna even more because this was a sound that human vocal cords were not meant to make. Eventually the boy fell asleep in the woman's lap. When he fell asleep his grip on Luna slacked off and she was dropped to the ground. The old woman saw this and freed up one hand to pet Luna.  
  
"There there little one." She said while stroking Luna's head. "Stay with this one, he will need your help or he will die. I know you will be a good friend to him."  
  
"Mrowr." Luna said. In truth she had been planning on staying with him to see if she could help him. Well that and being fed real food would be preferable to dumpster diving like she had been doing.  
  
The three of them sat like this for a little over an hour before a fat man in a dirty gi walked through the trees. He was about thirty or so although judging his real age was difficult because his bald head and glasses made him look a lot older than he probably was. Luna automatically didn't like him. His stench was wafting on the breeze all the way over to where she was. He reeked like the same man that put her into the pit. She would have attacked him however she knew that she would have no chance whatsoever against him.   
  
"You there old woman that's my son you've got there." He bellowed.  
  
"Ahh yes this nice kitty." She replied.  
  
"Are you senile old woman! He's a human not a cat!" Ok so the old bat was crazy as a fox. Probably had 50 cats around here.  
  
"I may be old but I'm not senile. I recognize the signs of the Neko ken training." Genma swallowed hard and started sweating profusely. "He should be alright now however he will be forever scarred by this." She sighed. "He has bonded to this cat and as long as she is with him he will not revert to this feral state."  
  
"So he won't be afraid of cats as long as this one is with him?" Genma was rubbing his hands together in his mind. If he could get rid of his son's fear then they could pretend this whole thing never happened and Nodoka wouldn't kill him.  
  
"Oh no, he'll still be afraid of them it's just that he won't go into his cat state as long as this cat is with him." She stopped petting them both. "If I were you I'd avoid my wife for a while." She made a slicing motion across her neck to indicate what she thought his wife would do to him.  
  
Genma grabbed his neck as if by holding it he could keep it attached to his body. He gulped. "Umm will he always be afraid of cats?"  
  
"Oh he'll always have the fear. Being torn to shreds by dozens of sharp claws and teeth will do that to a person. Over time he will learn to control the fear a bit but it will never quite leave him."  
  
Genma looked... relieved? There was still one more thing that he needed to know. "So he knows the Neko ken then?"  
  
The old woman looked down at the sleeping child. She put a small smile on her face as she was looking at his little face. "Yes it is a part of him now and as such he is no longer quite... human. Most of it's power will be reserved for when he is in his feral cat like state, however, with the help of this cat he may learn over time how to control it consciously."  
  
She glared at the fat man in front of her. Genma didn't know why he shrunk away from her gaze, guilt maybe, but he pulled away just the same.  
  
"If I could I would kill you on the spot and take him from you." She said in a voice that was suddenly not so old and was filled with power that Genma couldn't help but flinch at. "I can not though so I have no choice but to give him back to you." She shook the boys shoulder. "Wake up, wake up little one." She said in a calm soothing voice. The boy in her lap stirred and sat up. he stretched his arms and yawned.  
  
"Hello." He said to her. "Umm who are you and how did I get here?"  
  
"I'm just an old, old woman as for how you got here I'm not sure." She looked back at the fat man in front of her with a glare that could melt duritanium. "Your father came for you." She said while holding her glare on the man.  
  
"No! I won't go back to the pit!" Ranma screamed as he clung to the old woman.  
  
"Don't worry he won't be putting you back in the pit ever again. That's over." She said to him while somehow increasing her glare towards Genma as if daring him to contradict her.  
  
"Ahh no you won't be doing that again boy, you learned the Neko ken. I'm uhh proud of you or something." He said while scratching the back of his head.  
  
Ranma got off the old woman's lap. When he turned around to look at her again he saw the black terror that was still sitting beside her.  
  
"Ahhhh CAT!!" He screamed as he leapt straight up to the top branches of the cherry tree. Both Luna and Genma boggled at this as the top of the cherry tree was about two stories up and Ranma just jumped up there from a standing start.  
  
"Ranma get down here it's just a cat!" Genma yelled up at his cowering son.  
  
The old woman went over to the tree. "Ranma come down here she won't hurt you."  
  
"But it's a cat their evil, filthy, fleabitten..." He eventually trailed off and started shaking harder.  
  
"This one's different. You see she's a magical cat. Come down here and I'll show you." The old woman was smiling.   
  
When she was called a magical cat Luna's interest was peaked. Did the old woman hear her talking? Something was wrong here. Her musings were cut short as she heard a small thump off to the side. When she turned her head she saw Ranma crouched like he was back in the Neko ken. She wondered if cat boys always landed on their feet. Oh well there would be time enough later for introspection right now she had a job to do. She padded over to where Ranma was all the while trying to look as innocent and harmless as possible.   
  
As soon as Ranma saw the cat again he started shaking. He really wanted to run away but for some reason he couldn't or was that wouldn't? The cat stopped a few feet away from him and curled up trying to look as small and harmless as possible. Ranma took a step forward and kneeled down beside Luna. He reached out a shaky hand and lightly touched Luna's fur. He then started petting her roughly his hand moving in a very robotic way. Luna had to really resist the urge to slash him. The way he was pulling her fur and tender skin hurt damn it! She resisted this urge though because if she did lash out she would do way more harm than good.  
  
A small smile came to Ranma's face and he pulled his still shaking hand away.  
  
"You're right I'm not as afraid of her. What's her name?"  
  
The old woman smiled. "I used to know a cat named Luna a long long time ago." She pointed to the crescent shaped mark on Luna's forehead. "That kind of looks like a crescent moon so I think Luna would be a good name for her."  
  
Now Luna knew something was going on.  
  
"Luna?" Ranma said as he looked down at the cat. "Hi Luna I'm Ranma!" He said with a smile on his still shaking face.  
  
"Alright enough of this. Come on Ranma let's go."  
  
The old woman held up her hand.  
  
"Before you go I want the manual that you found the Neko ken training in." She held her hand out palm up as if expecting something.  
  
"What manual?" Genma tried to look innocent honestly he did.   
  
The old woman just gave him a flat stare like she knew exactly where it was hidden on her person but she just didn't want to touch him to get it.  
  
Genma cringed and reached into his underwear and pulled out the book that was hidden there. He handed it over to the old woman who took it from him and stepped back.   
  
"Alright now no more of these stupid training methods. You could kill him some day you know." She said in a serious voice. She sighed as she saw her words go in one ear, rattle around a bit and then come out the other ear jumbled into the way Genma wanted to hear them.  
  
"Come on let's go boy." Genma said as he turned and walked away.  
  
"Bye bye." Ranma said as he waved at the old woman while stepping in behind his father.  
  
The old woman waved at him before looking at Luna.  
  
"Don't you think you should be going now?" She said while arching one of her white eyebrows.  
  
"Mew." Replied Luna as she trotted off behind Ranma.  
  
Once they were around the bend the old woman waited for a few minutes until she heard a scream of 'CAT!' in the distance. She smiled and walked back into the house.  
  
Just inside the door she picked up the minidisk handycam that she had put down when she went outside. Now such a device would not garner a second glance ten years from now when such devices existed but in this time period...  
  
The old woman gave a little laugh her red eyes twinkling with suppressed mirth.  
  
Authors Notes:  
  
Sorry new story. This one and the other new story I'm working on are just backup stories for when I hit writers block. 


	2. Chapter 2

Dik$kl4m3r: l33t  
  
Chapter 2: Magical Mystery Kitty Force  
  
It had been a couple of days since Luna had joined the Saotomes on their training journey and she was already starting to regret it.  
  
Ranma's fear of cats had not lessened and he still screamed and tried to get away when he saw her. The only time he didn't was when he forced himself to look at her crescent moon on her forehead. It was these times that he actually mustered up enough courage to go over and pat her. Of course he still hadn't mastered the art of petting a cat without pulling its hair out. Luckily, it happened the one time that Genma had gone into town to steal some food for them... himself instead of getting his son to do it. Ranma was sitting on the ground in their campsite abusing.. I mean petting Luna. On one of his strokes, he cringed and pulled just a little too hard.  
  
"Ouch!" Complained Luna. She immediately covered her mouth realizing that she had said that out loud.  
  
Ranma looked down at the cat in his lap. He shuddered a bit more.  
  
"You can talk Luna?"  
  
"Mrow." Luna said as she attempted to cover up her slip.  
  
"I heard you talk now come on say something!" Ranma didn't think he was going crazy... well no more than he already was.  
  
"Mrow." Luna said again.  
  
"Alright you forced me to do this." He said as he grabbed Luna's tail in his right hand. He pulled hard.  
  
"Yahhhhh!!! God damned son of a fucking whore that hurts you stupid cocksucker. What the fuck do you think you're doing you little shit!" - Luna.  
  
"Oh wow you can talk!" Ranma was excited; he now had somebody to talk to.  
  
Luna was busy nursing her tail. "Yes I can talk are you happy now?" She said sarcastically.  
  
Of course Ranma couldn't understand what sarcastic meant so he replied. "Yup." With a huge smile on his face too.  
  
Luna was so tempted to pull his tail and find out how he liked it. Wait a minute... tail?  
  
Sure enough whipping around behind him was a little black tail.  
  
Luna was starting to get disturbed by this. Already a few days after the pit and his eyes still hadn't returned to their human shape. The pupils were still slitted and cat like and there were a couple of other things happening but Luna had just dismissed them as optical illusions. The first was his incisors looked a bit longer and the second was that his fingernails looked a tad longer than they were a few days ago. Now with the tail, she was really wondering if the other two were illusions or if they had some meaning.  
  
"Umm Ranma, since when did you have a tail?" Luna said while pointing behind him.  
  
"Tail? Where?" He said as he tried to turn his head around enough to see the tail. Sure enough, there it was wiggling behind him. He reached around and grabbed it with his left hand. He gave it an experimental tug. Sure enough, it hurt like hell.  
  
"Ow! Hey why do I have a tail!"  
  
"I asked you first." Said Luna.  
  
"How should I know? Wait a minute you can talk."  
  
"We already went over this." Replied Luna as she narrowed her eyes at him.  
  
"Yeah but now I've got somebody to talk to." He replied picking her up and putting her in his lap again. He unconsciously curled his tail around his waist like a belt. He started petting her again with his usual childish enthusiasm.  
  
"Not so hard!" Luna yelled as she felt her fur start to give way.  
  
Ranma stopped petting immediately. "What's wrong?"  
  
"You're petting way too hard! Ok now put your hand at the top of my head." He did so. "Ok now gently stroke from the top of my head all the way down my back to the tip of my tail." He followed her instruction perfectly, his martial training allowing him the dexterity to put just the right movements into the act that Luna started purring. "Now don't forget to scratch behind my ears." He did so. Training this human was turning out to be a breeze. She guessed him knowing about her ability to talk wouldn't be such a bad thing after all.  
  
As long as he didn't look directly at her, he wouldn't cringe. He closed his eyes and tried to imagine he was petting a skunk or a wolverine or some other cute and cuddly creature, anything but a vicious demon cat.  
  
A while later the sun was going down and Ranma was still petting Luna. A small twig snapped off to his left. Both he and Luna swiveled their heads to look at where the sound came from.  
  
It was Genma. He had a small sack and a much larger sack over his right shoulder.  
  
"Get over here boy and bring the furball." He boomed.  
  
Ranma got up and scurried over to where his father was putting down his loads.  
  
"Alright boy it's time for some more training."  
  
"What! But I haven't eaten today you old fart!" Whatever respect he had for his father had been severely diminished by the Neko ken incident.  
  
"Stop whining like a little GIRL and get over here." He said while pulling out two steaks from the smaller bag and piles of lead weights and rope from the larger bag.  
  
He had grabbed Ranma when he had gotten in range and started tying the weights to his torso, arms and legs. When he was done, he grabbed Luna. She tried to slash him but failed. He lashed a weight to her back and one to her stomach. He then took the steaks and lashed one to Ranma's back and the other to Luna's back. When he was done, he sat back and whistled.  
  
"So what the hell is this about old man?" Ranma said.  
  
"Its speed and endurance training. It's a big game of keep away. If you can keep the steak away from the wolves that are going to be chasing you, you get to eat it." He said with a smug grin.  
  
"What wolves?" Ranma asked dreading the answer.  
  
Genma just pointed at the snarling pack of wolves that were standing on the edge of the clearing.  
  
"Those wolves. Now go boy!" He said as he pushed Ranma towards the wolves.  
  
Ranma stumbled a bit, as he was unused to the weights. Luna was struggling to just stand upright. They both turned their heads to look over to where the wolves were snapping their teeth and slowly advancing.  
  
We take a break now to look at our friend Adrenaline.  
  
Adrenaline is a secretion of the adrenal gland. Millennia of evolution have given us this wonderful device, which is mostly used in the fight or flight mechanism. When we are frightened, the adrenal gland dumps loads of adrenaline into the bloodstream. Adrenaline's purpose is to enhance speed, strength, reflexes etc so that we are able to fight better or run away faster from the things that are trying to kill us.  
  
Both Ranma and Luna's adrenal glands were working overtime as their burst of speed and strength was used to move themselves as quick as they could away from the wolves that were chasing them.  
  
Adrenaline is our friend.  
  
Ranma was busy dodging around trees with Luna and the wolves nipping on his heels. He heard a faint cry from behind him and took a quick look to see what it was. One of the weights on Luna's belly had been snagged by a root and had tripped her up. The wolves had taken advantage of this and jumped her.  
  
"LUNA!" Ranma yelled as he spun around preparing to fight for his friend... even though she was a cat. His ki claws glowed faintly but he paid them no mind as he jumped into the fray.  
  
Luna knew she was screwed the instant she saw the root. She knew that she didn't have time to jump it and she also knew that it would get caught in the weight. She saw the ground rushing up to greet her and knew that she was about to die. She just wished that she could have at least completed her mission... whatever it was.  
  
She was down on the ground. She tried to get up but the first wolf had already reached her. He was a fairly young wolf maybe a year or so old. Just as he was going to bite her head off, she rolled out of the way and lashed out with her claws raking the side of his face. He quickly jumped back with a yelp. It wasn't over yet though as she had to dodge to the right to avoid the pounce of one of the females. Luna quickly kicked her in the nose before dodging again to avoid the swipe of one of the larger males. She quickly tensed and did a spinning uppercut to the bottom of his jaw. The big male was sent flying back.  
  
As she landed, she was tackled from behind by another large male. She could smell his hot breath in the air and really wished she had a milk bone or something. His jaws were slowly lowering onto her head and she could see bits and pieces of something in between his teeth. She would have rather not known that little fact. She struggled to move but he outweighed her by a factor of five or so, maybe more.  
  
Just as she was about to become a head shorter the weight that was pinning her down suddenly vanished and she was drenched in a shower of blood. She opened her eyes to see the head of the wolf lying beside her and the rest of his body laying a few feet away. Looking up she saw Ranma crouched over in the same stance that she saw when he was in the neko ken only the blank look wasn't completely there.  
  
"You alright Luna?" He asked still keeping a wary eye on the rest of the wolves.  
  
"Y.. yeah I think so." She replied as she shakily got to her feet.  
  
The wolves having just seen one of their own killed by this strange newcomer decided that the smartest thing to do would be to run like hell. Contrary to popular belief running with your tail between your legs is very difficult to do so they just ran with their tails behind them like usual.  
  
"Looks like we won doesn't it?" Commented Ranma as he looked around for any stragglers.  
  
"Yes it does." Replied Luna. She then winced as the pain hit her.  
  
Adrenaline is a wonderful thing but when it wears off you tend to crash.  
  
Ranma turned to look at Luna. He winced at what he saw. She had scratches all over her body and there was quite a bit of blood matting down her fur. He had no idea how much was hers and how much was the wolves. The only damage that he could see that probably wouldn't heal was the notch cut out of her left ear where one of the wolves' claws must have snagged. Ranma shuddered and took a step back when he finally registered that he was looking at a cat.  
  
"You look like hell." He commented looking away at one of the trees, rocks, bushes, anywhere but where Luna was.  
  
"I feel like it too." She said in return. "Can you get these weights off me I'd like to try and clean up a bit."  
  
"Yeah sure." He said as he walked over to where she was making sure that he kept his eyes on the crescent moon mark on her forehead. He bent over and removed the weights from around her torso.  
  
Luna immediately went about cleaning herself with her tongue. She started with her back. It was tough going and she wasn't making any progress.  
  
"This isn't working." She said with a sigh. "I need a river or something so I can get most of this out."  
  
"There was a stream by the campsite." Said Ranma as he looked over at the dead wolf.  
  
"I really don't want to go back there." Said Luna glaring at the small boys back. "At least we've got something to eat."  
  
"What are you talking about you lost your steak." He said while pointing at where the steak was supposed to be on the weights.  
  
"Nooooo! I was looking forward to eating that!" Yelled Luna as she wept for the loss of her supper. She looked at his back. "Well you lost yours as well!"  
  
"What!" He yelled as his hands whipped behind his back trying to feel where the steak should have been. It wasn't there of course.  
  
Back at the camp Genma gave out a loud belch. Bloody rare was the only way to eat a steak. His son would forgive him of course.  
  
Back where Ranma and Luna were they were both sitting on the ground staring up at the sky. A loud rumble came from both their stomachs.  
  
"I'm so hungry I could eat a horse." Ranma said as he covered his stomach with his hands.  
  
"I'm so hungry I could eat a dog." Replied Luna as she covered her stomach with her paws.  
  
"Why not?" Said Ranma as he looked over at her taking care not to look directly at her.  
  
"What do you mean?"  
  
"Well they eat dog in some countries so why not?"  
  
"What do you... Oh you mean him." She said looking over at the body of the wolf. "Well it'll be different I'll give you that." She started to chuckle. "Who would have thought cat eat dog." She broke down into hysterical gales of laughter.  
  
"You're weird." He said as he went over to skin the wolf and cut it up.  
  
Hours later Ranma and Luna returned to the campsite. Both were haggard and extremely tired. It had taken Ranma a while to butcher then cook the carcass especially since he didn't have a knife or anything with him to cut the meat. He had tried using his claws but for some reason he couldn't get them to come out. He had to resort to using a sharp rock. Then there was getting the fire started and then cooking it.  
  
In the end he was more tired from trying to cook it than the energy it would have taken to get back to camp and have some of his rations.  
  
That and wolf does not taste like chicken.  
  
Back at camp Genma was snoring away in front of the fire. Ranma briefly entertained the thought of trying to set his father on fire with some of the embers but eventually gave up on that idea since it would be more work than it would be worth. That and his father was a petty bastard and would come up with some way to get back at him for it.  
  
Ranma collapsed on his sleeping bag his head hitting the rock that his father had put in place of his pillow to 'toughen him up'. Deciding that he would have to get his father back for this he lapsed into unconsciousness.  
  
Luna plopped herself down beside Ranma's unconscious form. She shuddered a bit as she remembered being chased exactly like that on the... moon? She looked up at the grey moon barren of all life. Nah couldn't be, she thought as she fell asleep.  
  
The next day dawned way too bright and way too early. The birds were singing happily in the trees. Small forest creatures were scampering about trying to get their breakfast.  
  
This was how Genma greeted the morning as a warm liquid suddenly squirted him on his face. He raised his hand to wipe his face and scared the squirrel that was doing its business on him. He blearily opened his eyes and winced, as the sun seemed to pierce to the back of his head. After a few minutes of blinking, he finally was able to tolerate the light.  
  
He sat up and his arm came away wet when it brushed across his gi. He looked down and noted a white brownish goo all over his gi.  
  
Damn diaretic owls.  
  
Time to wake up the boy for sparring.  
  
He walked over to where Ranma was still sleeping. He was shivering even though it wasn't cold out. His little black tail was whipping back and forth.  
  
Of course Genma saw it, but chose to ignore it as it was obviously not there.  
  
Ahh the power of self-delusion such a wonderful tool.  
  
"Get up boy." He said as he booted his son off of his sleeping mat and into a nearby tree.  
  
Ranma was awake the minute that his father's foot hit his side. He twisted in midair so that he would hit the tree feet first. He rebounded off the tree and shot straight at the old man. Genma had not been expecting this and as such got tagged with the haymaker that his son threw out. Of course since Ranma was only six he couldn't get much power in his punch and as such just staggered his father a bit. Once Genma had righted himself again, he attacked back. With his neko enhanced speed and agility Ranma was able to avoid a good number of his father's attacks. Unfortunately for him, his father was in a bad mood this morning and wasn't holding back as much as he usually did. The punches that did connect were going to leave deep bruises. Ranma dropped after a few minutes of this.  
  
"Get your stuff ready we're moving on." He said gruffly as he went over to the stream to get the owl crap and squirrel piss off.  
  
Ranma struggled to his feet and staggered over to where his stuff was still strewn out on the ground. He started folding and packing his stuff in his backpack. Since he didn't want to get near Luna he just rolled her off. She ended up lying on her back with her feet stuck up in the air. When he had finished packing, he grabbed a stick from the ground and started poking Luna with it.  
  
"Hey Luna time to get up."  
  
"Piss off Artemis let me sleep five more minutes."  
  
"Who's Artemis?"  
  
Luna sprang to her feet baring her claws and teeth. There was nobody around though. She looked around confused for a few seconds before she saw a leaf fall out of a tree. She looked up only to see Ranma clinging to a tree branch twenty feet off the ground. She turned her head to see where Genma was. He was currently on the other side of the clearing eating something out of his pack.  
  
"Ranma what are you doing up there?" She hissed up at him.  
  
"C...C...CAT!"  
  
"Oh for sluggoth's sake get down here."  
  
"I can't."  
  
"Why not?  
  
"Because there's a cat down there."  
  
"You idiot I'm the cat! Just get down here." She said as she walked off towards where Genma was and started cleaning herself.  
  
A short time later Ranma was out of the tree and walking slowly beside his father. Luna was trotting beside him. Both of them had the weights tied to them but this time they didn't have the added advantage of adrenaline to help them. After a few hours of this Genma finally decided to stop in the next town for some lunch. When Ranma looked into his pack for his food rations that he had, he found that they were all gone, replaced with more weights.  
  
"POP!" He roared in his little squeaky kid voice.  
  
"Why is it always my fault?"  
  
"Because my food's gone!"  
  
"Maybe Luna ate it."  
  
"Luna has problems with her two weights! How the hell could she eat all of my food then put the weights in there?"  
  
"She's a smart cat" Ranma winced at that. "Go into town and get your own food like I showed you." He then laid down on the ground for a quick nap.  
  
"Stupid old man." Ranma muttered as he dropped the weights on the ground and trudged off towards town, Luna tagging along at his heels.  
  
The town was fairly small only 500 or so people. Luckily for Ranma and Luna, it was by the ocean so fresh fish was to be had at the local market.  
  
"But Luna isn't this stealing, and isn't stealing wrong?"  
  
"Usually yes but we're starving so it's more like forced charity." Luna said as she hunkered down waiting for the fishmonger to turn his back for a second. "Get down and follow my lead." She hissed.  
  
The fishmonger turned around to go over to another part of his stand. That was when Luna struck. Faster than Ranma could reliably track she shot out jumping over the stand, snagging a nice big piece of yellow fin on her way over. She was then off like a shot into the next alley. The poor sap never even knew that he'd been taken.  
  
Ranma duplicated her actions even going so far as to run on all fours and snag a piece for himself with his mouth. Of course since he was much larger than Luna the owner heard him coming and turned around just in time to see a boy running on all fours swipe a piece of tuna off his stand and take off. He hesitated a moment before he shrugged and turned back to his work.  
  
He'd have to listen to his wife and stop doing so much LSD before coming to work.  
  
Ranma scrambled into the alleyway that Luna was currently in eating her own catch. He took the fish out of his mouth with his left hand.  
  
"Hey you're right that was fun!" He said as he looked at the black cat that was chewing on some fish bones.  
  
"Mrrrow?" Went the black tom.  
  
"Ahh CAT!!!"  
  
Luna who was in the next alley over.  
  
"Idiot."  
  
The year's pass and Ranma grows up. Luna is trained just as hard as Ranma in the martial arts and becomes quite proficient. Ranma doesn't make friends with Ukyo as she's allergic to cats and can't stand to be around the strange boy and his weird cat. Luna remembers a bit of what she's about to do and tells Ranma to see if he knows anything about it. They search through some of the libraries but they don't find anything on magical kingdoms on the moon or magical warriors for the planets etc. Ranma concludes that Luna is smoking something really good and demands that she share. When she does, they have a good old time that night. In his last year of junior high Ranma makes 'friends' with Ryoga. Ranma has gained a bit of control over the neko ken but he is still deathly afraid of cats and still tends to slip into full neko mode if he's around a real cat for too long. The only one he'll let near him is Luna and even then it's a touch and go situation.  
  
A few days before Ranma and Ryoga were to have their showdown in the lot behind Ryoga's house, Genma came up behind Luna using the Umi Sen Ken. He grabbed her by the scruff of her neck and lifted her up.  
  
"All right furball it's time that you and the boy parted ways. The old woman was crazy after all, stupid boy's still afraid of cats." He turned her around so that he could look at her face. "It has something to do with that crescent mark on your forehead, so if the boy can't see it he won't know it's you and run for the hills." He chuckled evilly as he pulled out two bandages from his pack. "Don't worry this won't hurt a bit." As he covered Luna's crescent moon symbol she felt her intelligence leaving her.  
  
She hissed at him like a cat and took a swipe at his arm. He tossed her away. She growled at him and then took off at top speed away from the fat smelly human.  
  
Smiling to himself, he decided to let his son sit in the lot for a couple of days waiting for that moron to show up. That would give him time to find another cat that looked like Luna and his plan would finally work and he could get his son away from that troublesome feline.  
  
Oh yes, this was going to be fun.  
  
A few weeks after the Saotome's had left for China Luna found herself cornered against a wall. A bunch of little kids were throwing rocks at her. She let out a yowl of pain as a particularly big rock hit her in the leg.  
  
"What are you doing?! Get out of here you little brats!" Yelled a girl about thirteen or fourteen with long blond hair done up into two buns with hair trailing out behind her.  
  
The kids scrambled but not before some of them pulled their eyelids down and stuck out their tongues or patted their butts at her.  
  
"Bunch of brats." She scowled. "Are you ok?" She said as she picked up the cat. Luna was too hurt to really move much.  
  
When the girl took the bandage off her head her crescent moon symbol flared to life. She kicked out of the girls hold and flipped over her to look at her. The last thing she remembered clearly was Genma covering her crescent moon symbol. Everything after that was just a hazy blur. She shook her head to clear out the last cobwebs. She had to get away from this girl for now. She decided to keep an eye on her.  
  
Because no matter how much she wanted to find Ranma, she knew in the depths of her soul that she had just found Sailor Moon the leader of the Sailor Scouts.  
  
Authors Notes:  
  
Alright another chapter of Lunocracy out. I'll admit that I'm currently stuck on Cat's Tale. When I get unstuck, I'll work on it some more. I may have to write a new chapter of Lunocracy or Fast Tracks or start another short story. (I've got a couple of ideas in the works.)  
  
.  
  
Any comments etc go to nealharris@otakumail.com 


	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer: The world is flat you're being deceived.  
  
Chapter 3: Everything old is new again.  
  
Time passes as it is apt to do. Ranma and his father still went to Jusenko, they still ate the prize. Ranma was still dumped on Akane. The only noticeable difference is that another of Genma's extra fiancée's took Ukyo's place as his friend/fiancée. Her name was Sakura Kurinai and she set up a little tea shop. Martial arts tea ceremony. Other than that little blurb, time was more or less the same.  
  
For Luna it was pretty much the same. She rallied the scouts to defeat Beryl, the doom tree and Death Phantom. Nothing much changed, other than whenever Artemis would mouth off he would get trashed, or when Usagi overslept Luna would drag her charge out of bed and downstairs. The first time Mrs. Tsukino saw the eight kilo Luna dragging her 45 kilo daughter she almost had a heart attack. Since then she praised Luna and kept her well fed because the trip down the stairs usually woke her daughter up so she could get to school on time. Unknown to the rest of the scouts or even Artemis himself Luna kept up her practice so that she wouldn't lose her edge. Living next to the Yamada's and their pitbull and german sheppard was a blessing in disguise for her as both of them made great training partners.  
  
It happened on a fine spring day about two days after Ranma got back from his fight with Herb. Akane had been so happy that her favorite punching bag / stress relief had come back, she decided to cook him a feast. Said feast tried to take over the neighborhood. It was stopped by all of the martial artists in the area banding together to destroy the threat. When he'd commented about it she'd malleted him again. He'd have to remember to cancel her subscription to mallet monthly.  
  
So here he was flying through the air yet again. Looking down he noted passing over the boundary between Juuban and Nerima. Akane must have been pissed if she was able to get this much distance. Quickly calculating his trajectory he noted that he was going to land in a small pond in the middle of a park.  
  
At least it wasn't concrete.  
  
As he was dragging his now her waterlogged self out of the pond he noted a couple of perverts staring at his chest. He flared his aura to provide sufficient discouragement to said perverts and to dry his clothes. Someday he'd have to figure out how to use his ki to heat the water in his clothes and use it to change back with. But until that day he'd have to make due with that conveniently placed tea stand.  
  
After a quick change back to being a male part of the species, he decided that since he was in another ward he might as well take this break and get in some private time. The only crazy that could possibly find him this far out was Ryoga. The last time he saw the pig he was being coddled like the fat porker he was in Akane's arms. God's he wished that he didn't have to keep up this facade. The cat in him really wanted to just come out and 'play' with Akane's pet.  
  
The old man had ignored his cat like attributes and eventually dismissed them as being an illusion when he had learned to hide his non human features. Of course his time with Luna had helped him a bit with his problem with cats. He still shuddered at the thought of those little terrors.  
  
He still remembered the day she died. His old man had come up to him holding her by her tail. Who would have ever thought that a speeding M1 A1 Abrhams would be going down a side street in Tokyo followed by a full regalia of VF-1 Valkeries. What was left of the cat didn't look much like Luna except for the crescent moon symbol on her forehead. He had to hold back his tears for when his father wasn't watching. Real men didn't cry. Well at least they didn't cry where others could see them. When he was alone though he bawled his eyes out like a little girl.  
  
Who would have thought, him actually crying for a cat.  
  
It was a sunny day out. There was a slight breeze which ruffled his usual Chinese clothes and hair every so often as he walked. Since Akane had cooked him breakfast this morning he hadn't gotten anything to eat. He stopped by a ramen stand and fished around in his pockets for some change. He only came up with 750 yen. Not enough for anything serious (well a serious meal for him) but a light snack until he could scrounge up some cash.  
  
As he sat down the girl behind the counter gave him a huge smile. Leering would be a better word for it. He placed his order and sat back and watched as she went to fix it. All of a sudden his senses told him that he was being watched. He couldn't feel any malicious intent so he just sat there and carefully extended his senses. There were two girls. One was hiding behind the bushes directly behind him. She had a fairly powerful aura and he idly wondered if she was a martial artist. Further examination revealed that she was excited about something. Oh well a lot of girls in Nerima got excited about something or other when they were near him. He then focused on the other voyeur and noticed that it was yet another girl. She was hiding behind a garbage can. He focused on her further and noticed that there was a second ki signature right next to her. It was a cat.  
  
Well her chances were just shot to hell. Anybody who was a cat lover was right out in his book.  
  
"Here's your order sir." The ramen girl said as she held out a heaping bowl of ramen noodles piled high with lots of toppings including soft shelled crab, various types of fish, chicken, beef, and vegetables.  
  
Ranma sighed internally. Girls, especially the young ones, could never get his order right. It was sorta like scamming free food when he was a girl. Unlike when he was scamming hormone crazed boys he actually felt bad when girls got their hopes up only to have them crushed under the brutal reality that he was taken already. (taken by several girls actually) He looked up right into her shining eyes so full of hope and life. He smiled, thanked her for the food and started eating.  
  
Gods he was a weenie when it came to women.  
  
As he ate he noted a few more girls join the first two in watching him. One was on a roof across the street and another was trying to share hiding space with the first girl behind the bush. The newcomers were nothing special, just normal girls out boy watching.  
  
Before any new girls could show up he quickly finished his food thanked the girl, paid for what he had originally ordered and jumped from the street to the roof of a two story building. He started roof hopping away from there as fast as possible. Even if those two girls were martial artists, unless they were really hiding their true power, there was no way that they'd be able to keep up with him.  
  
Back at the Ramen stand all the girls left their hiding places and moved to leave. Minako spotted Makoto and she rushed over to her.  
  
"I saw him first!" They said at the same time.  
  
Artemis just hung his head knowing that no good could come of this. The weird thing about that guy (other than jumping to the top of a two story building) was that he moved as smoothly as Luna did.  
  
Ranma circled around and backtracked a bit before deciding that it was safe to go back to ground level. Once back on terra firma he decided to walk around for a bit since he still didn't want to get back to Nerima just yet. He set down near the park that he originally crashed down in. As he was about to walk by one of the bushes he heard two voices coming from the other side.  
  
"But I want to go have some ice cream. Lend me some money k?" It was a young girl's voice.  
  
"You still haven't paid me back from the last time!" A slightly older voice that Ranma thought was quite familiar.  
  
"But Lunaaa come on please."  
  
"No Usagi you'll get fat and then Rei will have a reason to call you porky." Luna said as she poked Usagi in the side.  
  
As soon as the girl Usagi said Luna he made the connection. It would be just like the old man to fake Luna's death just so he could separate them. He remembered all the good times he had with her. Firming his resolve he jumped over the bush, twisting in mid air so that he would be facing the bench when he landed. Everything was executed perfectly except for one minor detail. When he landed he looked up and  
  
"CAT!!!!!!!!!!!"  
  
Ran away from the cat at high speed and jumped up into a nearby tree.  
  
Usagi looked from where the crazy boy had gone to where Luna was.  
  
"Umm Luna do you know just what that was?" Usagi asked.  
  
"I don't... the only person to ever run away from a cat was..."  
  
Usagi had to back away quickly as Luna let off a guttural growl and her aura burst around her and started swirling around like a miasma of hellfire. If she didn't already know that Luna was on their side she would have pulled out her compact and dusted her. As it was the wood on the bench was getting quite scorched.  
  
"Ranmaaa!" She yelled before taking off at high speed towards the tree he had jumped into. She was leaving a trail of steaming grass as the water was evaporated by her battle aura.  
  
Usagi had only seen Luna this mad once before when Artemis got Mina to switch her cat food with cheap dog food. Minako has never been the same since then. Usagi still had the image of her little cat trashing a human girl six times bigger than she was. Luna only got the best cat food after that incident. She might have been the princess but it was Luna who was in charge in their relationship.  
  
She watched as Luna jumped into the tree that the crazy boy had gone into. There was a scuffle and the boy fell out of the tree. He righted himself and was about to run when Luna kicked him in the head. He went down but rolled and was about to get back to his feet when she pounced on him and started tearing into him with her claws.  
  
"You fuck! You cocksucking little shit how dare you just leave me behind. Do you have any idea what I had to go through? Do you! No of course not, you were off with your old man doing who knows what!" She yelled as she gave him a particularly violent punch to the face.  
  
Ranma had just about enough out of this talking kitty. On her next pass he grabbed one of her legs with amagouriken speed and tossed her to the ground. He immediately jumped on her and pinned her to the ground. When he looked down he saw the crescent moon on her forehead. He calmed down a bit enough to actually think.  
  
"Luna you're alive!" He shouted as he picked her up off the ground and put her in a death grip.  
  
"Cn't brt." Luna choked out.  
  
Realizing that he was about to do her in again he relaxed his grip on her. She took a deep breath to clear away the asphyxiation and prepared to launch into another tirade when his statement pierced her brain.  
  
"What do you mean alive?! I've never died you fuckwad!" She shouted.  
  
"Yeah well before we went to China pops shows me this mangled cat and said that you'd run out into traffic and got run over by a tank, some mecha, and the entire Harlem globetrotters."  
  
"And you believed him?" She asked his fate hanging on his answer.  
  
"Well yeah it did have a crescent symbol on its forehead just like you." He thought for a bit. "Come to think of it I think it was male."  
  
Ranma was about to get some forced ventilation when Usagi got her wits about her and decided to go see what was going on.  
  
The boy that was currently holding Luna was around her age. He had black hair tied back into a pigtail. His blue eyes shone like sapphires in the sunlight. His well muscled body was clothed in a silk tang and black kung fu pants. If she was Mina or Makoto she'd be all over him by now. As it was she had to keep repeating that she was only interested in Mamoru.  
  
"So Luna care to introduce me to your friend?" She asked crossing her arms under her breasts for emphasis.  
  
"Ahh Usagi this is Ranma. I traveled with him for quite some time before I met you." She twitched her ear that had the notch cut out of it. "I guess it's time that I told you girls the whole story. Let's go to the shrine." She said as she jumped out of Ranma's arms and started walking towards the shrine.  
  
"But Luna what about..." Usagi pointed at Ranma.  
  
She turned her head around to look at Ranma.  
  
"What about him?" She asked.  
  
"Well how can we trust him?" Usagi said a bit nervously. Luna was always harping that they keep their secret from everybody.  
  
"Hey!" Ranma shouted.  
  
"Ranma do you promise on YOUR honour that you will not tell anybody about what you're going to see and hear." Luna said.  
  
"Yeah sure I promise." He said a bit confused. Did it have anything to do with those magical girls that she was trying to find.  
  
"Good enough for me." She looked at Usagi. "Hey Usagi call the others and tell them to meet at Rei's shrine." She turned to Ranma. "Race you!" She shouted as she took off at speeds that Usagi only could hit when she was transformed.... with a tail wind.... going downhill.  
  
"No fair you furball. Get back here!" He shouted as he too took off chasing her cat.  
  
Usagi stood dumbfounded for a good five minutes before she got up the intelligence to call the others and inform them what had happened. Minako and Makoto were hesitant since they were both transformed and out boy hunting. Usagi thought that their prey must be something if they had to transform just to have a chance of catching the guy. Ami was of course studying, and Rei was sweeping. When she'd called Rei she'd only gotten a few words out before Luna ran past her kicking up some leaves and then Ranma right on her heals destroying most of the work that she'd done that morning. She turned off her communicator without listening to what Usagi had to say as she yelled at the boy and started chasing him towards the shrine.  
  
Back in the park Usagi shrugged her shoulders and started walking towards the shrine. Rei'd find out what was going on eventually. She briefly thought about transforming so that she could get to the shrine faster but decided against it just as fast. Luna had drilled it into their heads to not use their powers for mundane tasks. She also was a stickler for training. Ever since they had gotten their collective asses almost handed to them by Beryl, every Sunday she got them out for a couple hours of training in their powers. She had to admit that they had all gotten much better at not shooting their comrades or hapless bystanders since the training started. Of course she always held back when she trained them. The one time she tried to teach them martial arts the only two that got anything out of it were Makoto and Rei. She stopped trying after that little disaster. Since then she'd focused on tactics and teamwork.  
  
Come to think of it they'd never actually asked Luna what happened before they met her. The few times Artemis called her a tom cat because of the notch cut out of her ear she would respond by threatening to throw him to the wolves.  
  
Now Luna pulls this stunt with the crazy guy that she apparently knew some time ago and she was going to tell him everything. This guy had to be special for Luna to go and blow their cover like this.  
  
As she was walking up the steps to the shrine she saw Ami just ahead of her plodding along her head in a book as usual. Since she didn't want to be the last one to the meeting she dashed up the stairs passing Ami.  
  
When she got to the shrine she saw Ranma and Luna already there talking. Minako and Makoto were looking at him with hearts in their eyes, Rei was glaring at him for some reason, Artemis was cowering behind Minako, and Ami was sitting there reading her book. Usagi's jaw dropped. She was positive that she'd beaten Ami to the shrine. There was no way she could have beaten her there!  
  
"Ami... but how?!!!" She stuttered.  
  
"Sit down meatball head! I want to know just who he is and why he's talking to Luna and JUST WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON!!!" Rei shouted.  
  
"Yes mam." Usagi eeped as she dashed over and sat beside Minako.  
  
Rei was scary.  
  
After everybody was settled down Rei turned her glare towards the new boy and the infuriating cat advisor.  
  
"All right it's time to tell us EVERYTHING! Who is he? How do you know him?! Why are the martial arts you two use so similar?! And just who the hell is going to clean up the mess you two made!!!!?"  
  
If it wasn't for her senshi transformation Rei would have died from a massive coronary by the time she was twenty six.  
  
Luna stopped talking to Ranma and turned around in his lap. His hand automatically started petting her. To his credit he only shook a little bit. He forced his eyes up onto the brunette's breasts and imagined a cute and cuddly mink in his lap. He'd gotten very good at imagining other types of animals over the years.  
  
"Well..." Luna started. "It all started about ten years ago. Apparently the stasis capsule that I was in malfunctioned and I was awakened way too early. I knew that I wasn't a normal cat because I could talk but other than that I couldn't remember anything else. Since I didn't have a master I became an alley cat." She glared right through Minako to where Artemis was cowering.  
  
"One day his father " she indicated Ranma. "knocked me out and shoved me into a sack." There were several gasps at this. "I woke up in a dark pit with several dozen other starving cats. The lid to the pit was opened and Ranma here was thrown in. Since he was wrapped in fish sausage and smeared with fish paste the cats attacked him. I tried to defend him as best I could but I was too late. You see his father was trying to teach him this technique called the neko ken, the only thing he didn't do was read the big warning that stated that only a moron would try to teach the technique as it caused to user to develop a severe fear of felines."  
  
"That's terrible! What kind of parent would do that to their child?!" Usagi said.  
  
Both Ranma and Luna broke down laughing.  
  
"Oh that's funny." Ranma said wiping a tear from his eye. "You don't know my old man. That was just one of the boneheaded things he's done." He paused in thought. "Well there was that time that he tried to get me to fly by tying me to the back of that 747. Or there was that time that he tried to increase my resistance by shoving me down a cliff. Then there were the wolves...."  
  
"Wolves?" Several of the girls and Artemis said together.  
  
"I'll tell that story as it has a special place in my heart." Luna said as she recalled that particular incident.  
  
"Anyway back to the Neko ken. Well after he went crazy he started acting like a cat himself. He killed all the other cats in the pit and was about to kill me too but I accidentally mind melded with him." She dug her claws into his leg to warn him to keep quiet about what she was going to say next. "We escaped the pit and took off. We met up with this crazy old lady who helped him regain his human mind. She then said that I should travel with them and that I could help him get over his fear of cats or at least control it a bit. That's where we met. He found out I could talk a few days later and we became an inseparable team."  
  
"That's not how I remember it." A voice said off to the side of the room.  
  
Everybody looked towards the voice and saw Setsuna standing infront of a big screen tv. There was a surround system that had just magically appeared in the room.  
  
"This is how I remember it." She said as she pressed play on the mini disk player.  
  
On the screen there was a purring Ranma giving a tongue bath to a horrified Luna. The Luna in the room was transfixed on the screen. One of her most embarrassing moments was caught on film. Worst of all Artemis was watching! She just wanted to die right then and there. Little did she know that Ranma shared her sentiment.  
  
When the video ended Luna looked around for a tall green haired scratching post. Not finding her she settled for screaming to the heavens her frustrations.  
  
"When I get my claws on you Setsuna you will rue the day you messed with me! Do you hear me! I will claw out your spleen and use it for a kitty bed!"  
  
Either that or curse the existence of the Sailor scout of Pluto.  
  
While she was ranting Usagi went up to the system and tried to take the minidisk only to find that it was already gone.  
  
Rei was thinking that she now had something better to watch anime on rather than downloading it with the great fire.  
  
Once Luna calmed down enough she continued on with the story. When she got to the wolves and where she got the notch cut out of her ear Usagi fainted. Artemis promised himself to never ever tease Luna about it again.  
  
She might make good on her threat.  
  
Eventually they got to the part where they got separated. It had been several hours since they started. The girls didn't think that they could take much more of this. It was almost as crazy as some of their adventures. Makoto volunteered to go make snacks and get drinks for everybody. That and she needed time to think about what she'd heard.  
  
Luna finally spoke up about something that had been bothering her ever since the park.  
  
"Ranma where are your ears?" She asked.  
  
"They're on the side of his head where they're supposed to be." Usagi said. She was trying to be helpful. After what she'd heard about her cat she was amazed that she retained any sanity at all.  
  
"No, no that's not what I meant." She said shaking her head.  
  
"Oh you mean that. After pops faked your death I learned how to hide them." He said as he released his control. There was a brief flash of light and he had a black tail, cat's ears and eyes, claws and fangs.  
  
"See?" He said.  
  
The girls all reached for their henshin pens and got ready to transform at a moments notice if he did anything weird. Ok weirder than what was already happening. Over time they'd all developed a shoot first, keep shooting attitude. You really couldn't blame them though when everything is trying to drain your energy for some evil plan.  
  
"That's better. It was weird seeing you without them." Luna said as if all was right with the world.  
  
Minako was the first one to get her voice back.  
  
"So he's not a youma?" She asked easing her henshin pen back into storage.  
  
"No he's not. I quite honestly don't know why he developed cat like traits. It could have something to do with the Neko ken training, or it could be the magic I hit him with, or it could be a combination of both."  
  
"So he's a cat boy?" Rei asked.  
  
"I guess." Ranma replied as he shrugged his shoulders.  
  
Just then Makoto came back into the room carrying the snacks and drinks. She took one look at Ranma, tossed the tray at him to buy her some time and transformed into Sailor Jupiter. Ranma blocked the tray but as everybody might have guessed he couldn't avoid the juice that was on the tray. One quick switch later and he was forced to start dodging a Sailor scout that was on full offensive.  
  
Now while the Sailor scouts are faster, stronger and all around tougher when they're transformed it was only a multiplicave factor of their normal speed and strength. Makoto was a black stripe in Shotokan Karate and as such was plenty fast and strong. Normally Ranma would eat full black belts for breakfast, however with her enhanced speed and strength Makoto was way beyond what a normal black stripe should be capable of.  
  
Of course with the cat loose Ranma's normal speed, strength, and most importantly agility were increased as well. Also even though he was loathe to admit it his girl form had the advantage in speed and flexibility.  
  
The end result was Ranma dancing almost effortlessly around a charging Jupiter. With each miss she was getting more pissed off. Her friends were just sitting there slack jawed while she did all the fighting. She couldn't even toss off any of her spells since she might hit one of them.  
  
"What are you waiting for! He's a youma!" She shouted as she tried to hit the dodging girl again.  
  
Ranma just slid around the punch like a cat stretching after sleeping in a sunbeam for a long time.  
  
"Makoto stand down!" Shouted Luna. She was not happy that her petting session was interrupted. The turning into a girl was new, but she'd been with Ranma for ten years. He knew instinctively exactly how to pet her.  
  
"But Luna he turned into a girl... and the ears and tail. How can you tell me to stop?" Makoto asked while taking a defensive stance.  
  
"Well as I was telling the other girls the cat ears, tail, eyes etc. are from a training accident mixed with magic." She looked at him. "You can explain the girl thing can't you?"  
  
Relaxing a bit he decided to sit down again. Jupiter just stood there eyeing him warily.  
  
"Yeah well after we parted we headed off for China. The old man took us to these cursed springs Jusenkyo even though he didn't speak a word of Chinese." He turned to Jupiter. "Uhh could you get me some hot water?" He asked.  
  
"Sorry I'm still not convinced you're not a monster. I'll just stay right here." She said as she firmed up her stance.  
  
"I'll go get it." Ami volunteered as she got up and went off to the kitchen. She left her computer on to record everything that was happening.  
  
"Thanks. Anyway so we get to this place and let me tell you it didn't look like much. Just a bunch of bamboo poles sticking out of these pools. It may not have looked like much but my cat senses were just going crazy trying to warn me of the danger even though I couldn't see or smell anything. To make a long story short anything that falls into the pools takes the form of whatever drowned in there when splashed with cold water, hot water reverses the curse. I hit the old man into the spring of drowned panda. Imagine my surprise when a panda jumps out of the pool. He clipped me on the shoulder. I managed to right myself so that I would land on my feet but I couldn't avoid falling into the pool." He hefted his breasts. "Spring of drowned girl if you hadn't guessed."  
  
Jupiter spoke next as she lowered her defense a bit.  
  
"So you're mostly human? You're not after energy or heart crystals or anything?"  
  
"Uhh what?" He turned back to Luna. "I guess you found those warriors from the moon kingdom eh?"  
  
Luna scratched the back of her head. "Yeah but I was wanting to introduce you on better terms." She glared at Jupiter. "Stand down he's not going to hurt you. Besides from what I saw he could tear you apart quite easily."  
  
"Yeah right if I could use my magic I'd paste him." She said defiantly as she transformed back.  
  
"You'd have to hit him first, and quite honestly I don't think you'd be able to." Luna said with a smirk. "Dodging pellets from a pellet gun helps you get really good at dodging. You'd have to all work together to catch him. Remember that training where you tried to tag me? It took all of you three months just to tag me once. Now you understand what a highly trained martial artist can do when properly motivated and enhanced by a little bit of magic."  
  
"So he's better than us?" Ami said as she came back with the glass of hot water.  
  
"No I wouldn't say that. For instance the monsters we fight can't be hurt by physical attacks, only magic will work." She watched as Ranma poured the hot water over her now his head. "Since I don't think Ranma has any magical attacks he wouldn't be able to do any damage to the monster."  
  
"Hey" He protested.  
  
"It's true. I don't think your claws count as magic and unless it's magical it won't hurt them." She shrugged as best she could with her kitty shoulders.  
  
"Yeah well... hey did you ever find her?" He asked.  
  
"Her?" Luna said confused by what he meant. "Oh you mean the princess?" They gasped.  
  
"Luna! How could you!" Artemis shouted as he jumped out from behind Minako. "How could you tell him about the princess and the Sailor scouts?" Open guillotine, insert head.  
  
Luna spared a brief glance upwards to see Ranma clinging to the ceiling. Figuring he was alright for now she decided to play her favorite game.  
  
"Artemis you idiot."  
  
Tear a strip off Artemis.  
  
"When you woke up exactly how much did you remember?" He was going to say something but she cut him off. "Not much that's what. Well guess what! I woke up years before you! All I knew was that I had to do something. What it was I couldn't remember. When I hooked up with Ranma and he found out that I could talk I used him to help me search for anything that could help me figure out what to do." She sighed. "In the end it came down to blind luck." She turned back on him. "Besides he's given me his word that he wouldn't tell anybody." She said like it was the most natural thing in the world.  
  
"And you're just going to take his word that he's not going to tell anybody! How the hell can you trust him!" Artemis yelled back not knowing exactly how dangerous this was.  
  
"I trust his honour." She said quietly. "I've known him for so long that when he gives his word on something nothing will make him break it. If he gives his word to not betray us I believe him." She finished with a snarl. "Now sit down before I have to hurt you." Her battle aura sprang to life and her crescent moon glowed like hellfire.  
  
"Yes mam." Artemis squeaked out as he dashed off behind Minako. He'd just lost three lives right there.  
  
Luna took a minute or three to calm down again. When she looked up she noticed that all of the girls had pulled out their henshin pens and were standing at the ready. She sweat dropped. After a bit they too calmed down and put away their armaments.  
  
Of course this entire show was wasted on Ranma who was still clinging to the ceiling for dear life. Luna sighed as she remembered exactly how hard it was to get him back to normal once he was spooked.  
  
"Ranma get down here!" She yelled knowing it would do no good.  
  
"No there's a cat down there!" He retorted digging his fingers into the wood beam.  
  
"Artemis is gone now. Honestly he's a Lunar cat just like me. Just look at the crescent on his forehead."  
  
"Tried that doesn't work." He said as he remembered looking at the crescent and only seeing a cat.  
  
"That's weird." She said more to herself. "Anyway he's gone now so get back down here."  
  
"You sure he's gone?" He asked timidly.  
  
"Yes I'm sure he's gone." She glared at a point behind Minako daring Artemis to do anything.  
  
Reassured by her Ranma dropped easily from the ceiling. He landed on his feet of course.  
  
"Ranma I'd like to introduce you to the Sailor scouts and Princess Serenity." Luna said with a bit of pomp and flair.  
  
Not waiting for Luna to properly introduce them he walked up to Rei and knelt before her.  
  
"It's an honour to finally meet you princess." He said as he bowed with his arm crossing his chest.  
  
All in all he looked quite noble. Except for one fact.  
  
"Umm Ranma she's not the princess." Luna said as she took a quick look at Usagi who as now fuming.  
  
"I don't understand." He said looking at Luna then back at Rei. "She's commanding and authoritative. She carries herself like she's in charge and she acts like it too. How can she not be the princess?"  
  
Rei of course was gloating.  
  
"Hah take that Usagi he can tell royalty when he sees it." She said flipping her hair.  
  
"But I'm the princess!" Usagi shouted her ponytails flailing behind her.  
  
Luna put her paw to her forehead to try and stave off the headache she knew was coming.  
  
"And just how many princesses do you know?" She asked dreading his answer.  
  
"A few actually." He said scratching his chin. Shampoo was technically a princess and with the correct application of cold water so was Herb. He turned towards Usagi.  
  
"So she's the princess?" He asked studying her intently. "But she's clumsy, lazy, whiny, submissive, and she's taking care of you instead of letting one of her minions do it."  
  
Usagi was just about to blow a gasket.  
  
"Actually her mother feeds me and other than that I pretty much take care of myself."  
  
"I AM NOT CLUMSY!" Usagi yelled as she stood up rapidly. She of course lost her balance as she tripped on one of her trailing ponytails and did a perfect ten faceplant.  
  
"Are you absolutely positive that she's the princess?" Ranma asked.  
  
"Unfortunately yes." Luna said as she hung her head.  
  
"Hey!" Usagi shouted at her cat as she got back to her feet.  
  
Luna ignored her and continued on with the introductions.  
  
"This is Ami Mizuno aka Sailor Mercury." She said indicating Ami with her paw.  
  
"Next we have Minako Aino aka Sailor Venus." Pointing to Minako.  
  
"Then there's Usagi Tsukino our Princess Serenity aka Sailor Moon." She said as she waved her paw in Usagi's general direction.  
  
"Hey I'm worth more than a general mention!" Usagi protested again.  
  
"Next on our list is Rei Hino aka Sailor Mars." She said pointing at Rei with her paw.  
  
"And finally you're already familiar with Makoto Kino aka Sailor Jupiter."  
  
"Uhh sorry about trying to kill you." Makoto said sheepishly as one could after one just tried to kill the guy you were lusting after.  
  
"Eh? No problem. All of my friends and fiancées have tried to kill me at one point or another." He said as if trying to kill him was normal or something.  
  
"Fiancées!" All the girls shouted.  
  
"It's a long story." Ranma said as he proceeded to explain about Akane, Sakura and Shampoo.  
  
Authors notes  
  
Ak! Gods do I suck. Oh well here's chapter three. Yes I do know that Setsuna doesn't actually appear until I think it was around the dark moon circus arc but hey I needed a plot device.  
  
I think next up will be Cat's Tale. I've ignored that series for quite long enough.  
  
nealharris@otakumail.com 


	4. Chapter 4

Disclaemr: The following work was done by thousands of monkeys on thousands of typewrighters plagerizing the works of Ranma 1/2 and Sailor Moon for the enjoyment of others.

Don't sue the monkeys as they have no pants.

Chapter 4: Meet the Folks

The girls were stunned by his story. Minako and Makoto wanted to 'save' him from those evil girls. Rei wanted to know how he stopped himself from killing his father for all the crap that he put him through. Ami wanted measurements. Artemis wanted out of the room so he could get a head start on Luna for all the good it would do him. Finally Usagi wanted a triple fudge sundae.

Luna of course wanted to go with him.

She was quite vocal about it as well.

"What are you talking about? Of course I want to go with him!" Luna said in a tone that said that she was going and that was that.

"But Luna what if another monster attacks? What are we going to do without you?" Usagi whined.

Luna flattened her ears against her head.

"I thought I taught you better than that." She hissed. "If a monster shows up kill it as usual. When in doubt just do what Ami tells you to do." Luna sometimes wondered just who the leader of the scouts actually was. Ami was a poor fighter but a brilliant tactician.

"But... But... " Usagi looked like she was going to cry at any moment now.

Luna let out a huge sigh.

"Don't worry I'm not leaving you. I'm only going to visit him for a few days that's all." She said in a motherly voice.

"Speaking of which we should be getting going now if we're going to be home for supper." Ranma said looking at the clock on the wall.

"Couldn't we just take the train?" Luna asked.

"We could but we'd be riding outside which I guess would be ok." Ranma said as he scratched the back of his head.

"So we're running then." Luna said flatly.

"Don't worry I'm much faster than I used to be." Running away from fiancee's all the time really upped his speed a lot.

"Then let's go!" Luna said as she jumped on his shoulder. "I'll be back in a couple of days."

"Later!" Ranma said as he walked through the door and jumped to the nearest roof.

There was a pregnant pause during which all of the girls were thinking. Finally Makoto spoke up.

"He's mine I saw him first."

"No way you did I saw him first!" Minako countered.

From there the impromptu meeting degraded into a chaotic free for all as to who was going to get first crack at Ranma.

Rei of course was enjoying Naruto on her new system.

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The scenery was streaking past at blinding speeds as Ranma and Luna made their way back to the Tendo dojo in Nerima. Since it was a fair ways away from the Cherry Hill Temple it was going to take them some time even at the speeds that Ranma was traveling at. Luna decided now would be a good time to take a nap as she wanted to be fresh and alert when she met Ranma's adopted family.

Truth be told she was a little disappointed that Ranma already had three fiancee's. She was hoping to set him up with the princess or one or more of the scouts. She tolerated Mamorou because Usagi liked him but in all honesty she thought that she deserved better than that dickless wonder that would come in throw a freaking rose, offer some half assed words of encouragement and then leave. If she could get Ranma a magic weapon or something he'd be twenty times more effective than that flower boy.

As it was she'd have to ask Ami about it when she got back. For right now she would have to evaluate these other girls and see if any of them were right for Ranma.

She yawned as she synced her ki with Ranma's so that she wouldn't fall off his shoulder. It was a technique that she developed on the road so she could sleep on his shoulder without fear of falling off.

Yes those girls would get a thorough examination and if she wasn't satisfied she'd do everything to break the engagements.

Her Ranma deserved much better and Luna was going to make sure he got the best mates.

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Once Ranma reached a few blocks from the dojo he dropped down into an alley and hid his cat features. There was a flash of light and a brief surge of ki as he did so. This surge disrupted Luna's ki anchor and she unceremoniously dropped off his shoulder. She was awake and had righted herself so that she would land on her feet.

"What'd you do that for?" She asked as she looked down at the filthy ground.

"We're almost there. Nobody at home knows about this so I have to hide them." He said as he indicated where his ears and tail were.

"Oh." Luna said as she jumped back onto his shoulder. "I just didn't expect it to disrupt my ki anchor that's all." She said as she settled back in.

Ranma walked out of the alley with Luna perched securely on his shoulder. As luck would have it Shampoo was riding by on her bike with a delivery. She was about to jump off and glomp him when she saw that he had a cat on his shoulder. The shear shock value alone was enough to cause her to slam face first into a telephone pole. Ranma of course missed the entire thing. Luna was considering asking but then thought better of it. Maybe it was normal for this district for young girls to run full tilt into telephone poles. Then again Ranma was fairly attractive for his species so maybe that was it. She'd have to do some more investigation and see if that was a normal occurrence before asking him about it.

Soon they came to the gates of the Tendo compound. Luna looked around taking in the scene. She admired the house and strong high walls. It even had it's own sushi bar with the koi pond. All in all it looked like a fairly nice place to live. She'd have to remember to bug Usagi into getting a koi pond or maybe a fish tank full of fish. Soothing, calming, relaxing, edible art.

There was a young girl about a couple of years older than Ranma sweeping the sidewalk just outside the gate. To Luna's senses she radiated calm and peace. She also looked to be the matronly kind of person. Definitely a good cook if the clean apron could be any indicator. This one scored highly on Luna's affinity meter if for nothing else than a warm lap to sleep in and good petting.

"Hey Kasumi." Ranma said as he approached.

"Hello Ranma. Oh my isn't that a cute cat on your shoulder." She replied as her view of reality was taken and ripped to shreds.

"Nah. Luna's not a cat, she's a mongoose. She used to be my pet before pops faked her death and made me believe she was dead. Speaking of which is the old man around?" Ranma said as he gave her a pat on the head. Luna of course had given up over the years at trying to make him call her a cat. She just chocked it up to a self defense mechanism and stopped caring. Besides it was interesting the different animals she was called.

"Of course. He and father are playing shouji on the veranda." She said as a yeti riding a bull with crane and eels with octopus tentacles walked by in the background and waved at her before continuing on.

"Thanks Kasumi." He said as he walked past her towards the main house.

Once he was safely out of sight Kasumi reached into the pocket of her apron and pulled out several mushrooms that she'd found growing in the yard. She'd planned on making them into sukiyaki tonight. She wound up and tossed them as far away as she could. Halucinagenic mushrooms always gave her gas anyway.

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Inside the house Ranma removed his shoes and left them by the entryway. He headed towards the veranda where he knew his old man was playing that stupid game with Mr. Tendo. Sure enough as he rounded the corner he saw his pops and Mr. Tendo infront of the board.

"Hey pops." He said.

"Shouldn't you still be in school?" Genma said not taking his eyes off the board for fear that Tendo would capitalize on his moment of weakness and change the pieces around to his own advantage.

"Yeah well Akane hit me all the way to Juuban so I missed school." He said as he took Luna from his shoulder.

"Boy you've got to get along with your fiancee better." Genma groused. How was he supposed to retire if his stupid son couldn't even keep his mouth shut and eat the slop his loving fiancee made for him.

"Yeah whatever. Hey pops guess who I found wandering around Juuban." Ranma said as he hefted Luna.

"I don't really care if you ran into that directionally challenged idiot." Genma replied. Honestly it was like his son expected him to actually care about his life or something. The nerve of the boy.

"Actually pop you know her already." Ranma said.

"Who is it? I'm pretty sure I didn't engage you to any other girls." Genma said aloud still not turning to face his child.

"Luna pops. Come on how could you forget about her?" Ranma said as he wound up and tossed Luna at his father.

"Lu..." Genma said as he finally turned his head only to be hit head on by a flying kick by an enraged moon cat.

What followed was a pretty intense beating on both sides. Luna was getting her mad on for being ditched all those years ago and Genma was trying his best to not be turned into a scratching post.

Soun turned from the scene to see if Ranma was going to assist his father subdue the wild cat.

"Son how dare you let that wild cat attack your father! Aren't you going to help him!"

"Nah. Luna's not a cat she's a svelte badger and pop's has got this coming to him." Ranma sat down in the spot that his pop had occupied and watched as Luna delivered a particularly good uppercut to the old man's family jewels.

Both Soun and Ranma winced at this.

"Hold on Saotome I'm coming!" Soun shouted just before Ranma knocked him unconscious.

"Go Luna!" Ranma shouted from his place on the veranda.

"Oh my Ranma kun your cat seems to not like Mr. Saotome." Kasumi said as she tried to feign caring.

"I don't know why everybody calls her a cat. She's a mutant gopher. She has every right not to like pops after everything he put her through. Besides she's got a few years of anger to work through." Ranma said as Luna finished burying his old man.

Luna flung some more dirt over the spot where she had buried Genma. The only indication that he was there was his hand sticking out of the ground. Once she was satisfied that he was properly punished she decided to go back to where Ranma was and see if she could score points with that Kasumi girl.

"Ranma shouldn't you go help your father he could suffocate you know." Kasumi said as she watched Luna walk back towards where she was standing.

"Nah he'll be fine... I think. Besides I think she's just getting even for the time he buried both of us six feet down to teach us how to get out if we're ever buried in a landslide or something." Ranma said remembering the incident.

He watched as Luna bypassed him and went to rub up against Kasumi's legs. He was not surprised since everybody he knew liked Kasumi and he didn't expect Luna to be any different. Kasumi bent over and picked her up off the floor and cradled her in her arms.

"Ranma are you sure this is your cat? I mean she looks normal. Maybe your father didn't fake her death." Kasumi said as she started petting Luna.

"Oh I'm sure that's Luna. You see that crescent moon on her forehead. It's like a birthmark or something. She's the only cat that I know of that has that." He said as he watched her being petted. "That and the notch cut out of her ear was from the wolves. I don't think she's quite forgotten that yet though." He watched as Luna started purring up a storm. "I think she likes you."

"She's such a nice badger. Oh my I wonder what badgers eat." She said trying to figure out what to feed her.

"She likes fish. Pretty much any kind will do. She also has a thing for sake." He lowered his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. "Just don't give her too much she can be an angry drunk."

Of course Luna heard this. She turned her head and growled at him. Kasumi, not wanting to be anywhere near a pissed off cat, dropped Luna.

Like most cats Luna landed on her feet. Unlike most cats she decided that Ranma needed to be taught who his master was and decided to attack him with fur and claws flying.

Ranma who had been expecting an attack, because honestly that's what he said it for, dodged Luna's initial lunge and danced out into the yard so he would have room to go airborne. Luna may be good but he was much better thanks to all the techniques he'd picked up from various sources.

Kasumi watched the boy and his 'cat' playing in the yard. She glanced to where Mr. Saotome had been buried and sure enough there was only a crater where he'd been. Kasumi frowned as she knew that she'd be the one who had to fill in the hole and replant the grass. She couldn't really fault Luna because she was just a dumb animal and didn't know the work she was creating. Maybe she could get Ranma to do it.

"Hey sis what's up?" Nabiki said as she looked out into the yard.

"Ranma found his pet cat and now they're sparring in the yard." Kasumi said as she turned to go into the kitchen to start supper.

"Umm sis wasn't Ranma afraid of cats?" Nabiki said as she watched Luna take a swipe at Ranma and miss.

"Oh he's just in denial." Kasumi called back from the kitchen.

"I'm home!" Akane called from the front door.

"Hey Akane come here you've got to see this!" Nabiki called watching Ranma get a good hit in.

"What's u..." Akane trailed off as she watched Ranma fighting in the yard with a cat and not running away in terror.

Of course Akane's train of thought immediately switched tracks, derailed then exploded in a flaming ball of fury.

"RAAANMAAA you pervert!" Hear the battle cry of the tomboy.

"Wha?" Ranma said a he reflexively turned his head to look where the scream came from just in time to see Akane's trademarked mallet descending.

"Serves you right making us believe you're afraid of cats." She huffed. She still hadn't forgiven him for kissing her infront of the school when he was in the 'neko ken'.

Luna seeing the attack on Ranma arched her back and hissed at the girl. She'd heard the name Akane being used and belatedly connected the dots. This violent girl was one of Ranma's fiancee's. Sufficed to say Ranma wasn't kidding when he described her. Infact he probably understated her personality a lot. Based on the opposing ki field she was giving off Luna automatically didn't like her. Hearing Ranma try to pull his head out of the ground and the girl Akane winding up for another swing Luna made a snap decision to do something. She stepped infront of Ranma and let off a low warning growl. Now to most creatures when something is growling at you it's a good indication to get the hell away from that area. Unfortunately Akane never was one for seeing signs.

As Akane was bringing the mallet down to inflict more punishment on her deserving fiancee Luna launched herself towards her mallet arm intending to disarm her before thrashing her like she so royally deserved. What she did to Minako would seem like a love tap compared to what she planned to do to this girl. Akane was wholly unprepared for such a small cat to attack her with such ferocity.

Ranma pulled his head out of the ground and shook it to dislodge as much dirt as he could. He was wondering why Akane wasn't smashing him down again. She usually didn't stop until he was unconscious. He looked up just in time to see Luna flinging Akane around like a rag doll in the jaws of a pit bull.

"Luna put her down!" Ranma yelled.

Reluctantly Luna dropped the hapless girl and trotted over to where Ranma was sitting on the ground. She hopped into his lap and urged him to start petting her. Instead of aquissessing to her demands he got off the ground and put her on his shoulder. He then walked over to where Akane was still lying face down on the ground. He picked her up by the back of her school jumper and hauled her over to the veranda and then flipped her over so that she was lying on her back. He then left her there.

"That's some cat you've got there Saotome." Nabiki said as she narrowed her eyes.

"Luna? I keep telling people she's a diabetic beaver. She's my best friend." He said with a happy smile.

Nabiki was taken aback by this. Sure she'd seen him smile before but those were usually cocky 'I'm going to win' smiles. Other times the smile was forced and obviously looked fake. Now however she could see the happiness radiating off the boy. She had to bat away one of the little pink hearts that floated her way. She had no need for such things.

"Is it just me or did I see Luna doing some Anything goes moves?" Nabiki asked as she looked at the cat with the halo above it's head.

"Well yeah. Pops thought since she was coming with us she should learn Anything Goes as well." Ranma said as he pulled Luna from his shoulder and held her out to Nabiki.

"Sorry I don't like cats." Nabiki said as she turned and walked to the kitchen to see what Kasumi was doing.

"Come on Luna I'll show you my room." Ranma said as he dashed up the stairs to the guest room.

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Genma had of course taken up residence in the guest room to recover from the beating that cat had given him. He grumbled to himself that he should have never taught that furball Anything Goes. With her natural speed it was damn near impossible to hit the bloody thing. She didn't hit very hard though but that was pretty much the only saving grace as she made up for it in the number of times she hit.

Just as he was about to lay down for a rest the door slid open and in walked Ranma with that demon cat of his. He tensed not wanting to be turned into a scratching post twice in one day.

"Hey pops. I think Mr. Tendo should be waking up about now. You'd better hurry before he rearranges your shouji board." Ranma said as he walked further into the room.

"Mrrrrrr" Luna said as she too wanted to get rid of the fat man and talk to his son alone.

"Ahh yes I can't let Tendo get the upper hand now can I." He said nervously as he jumped out of the window.

"Well then we're alone now." Ranma said as he closed the door. "So what do you think so far?"

"I think you should dump Akane and get engaged to that Kasumi girl." Luna stated flatly.

"Yeah Kasumi's nice and all but I mean she's four years older than I am AND she's pretty boring." Ranma said as he sat down under the window leaning up against the wall.

"I haven't been here long enough to really get a judge on her personality." Luna said as she urged him to start petting her.

"What do you think of Akane and Nabiki?" Ranma said although he already knew the answer.

"I don't like Akane. You really understated her temper though." She said as she started kneading his leg. "I won't see you in that kind of relationship. As for Nabiki I think she's too smart for her own good. I think she suspects that I'm not a normal cat." Luna said as she turned around in his lap. "I would like to meet Shampoo and Sakura and see what they're like."

"Yeah sure. Although I do have to warn you..."

"Meow." Came a voice from above his head.

Ranma slowly tilted his head up so he could visually confirm that there was a real feline above his head. Sure enough he made eye contact with a cute as a button cat with white and pinkish purple fur. His mind was in such a terror filled mode that he never noticed the beads in the cats fur.

"CAAAAAATTTTTTTT!" Ranma screamed as he tore out of the room running right through the door to get away from the cat.

"Alright you pampered pussy now you've got a load of hurt coming." Luna was furious that her petting was interrupted by this upstart.

The cat seemed to freeze and fall from the window. It must have been pampered all it's life if it was this clumsy. Luna decided that she wouldn't punish it too much but that didn't stop her from taking the advantage while it was picking itself of the floor to attack. The resulting fight was short but anything but decisive. The 'pampered' cat fought surprisingly well for one that had led a life of luxury and Luna found herself having to take up the level of her attacks to very near her maximum level.

The fight ended with Luna standing over an obviously injured cat. She belatedly cursed herself for going that far on somebody's pet. The other cat struggled to her feet and limped over to where Luna was still standing. The other cat's head was bowed in submission. Luna was going to give the other cat a lick to signify that all was forgiven when the other cat darted forward aiming for her neck. Luna turned her head to intercept and they ended up in liplock.

"Why you little..." Luna growled out.

Apparently the other cat got the message because she turned around and bolted out of the room through the open window as fast as her injured kitty legs would carry her. Luna huffed as she spat on the floor. Pampered or not she didn't want to be going around kissing other cats.

Deciding that for now finding Ranma took priority she decided to go search for him.

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Finding Ranma was surprisingly easy. All she needed to do was follow the path of destruction. She eventually tracked him to the tree in the yard. Somehow he'd changed into a girl and was now huddling near the top of the tree. Letting out a sigh she jumped onto the first branch of the tree and continued upwards until she was sitting across from where he was cowering.

"The cat's gone now Ranma you can come down." Luna said in a whisper.

"You sure?" Ranma said in a small voice.

"Yup I whipped her ass good. Sneaky little bugger though she tried to go for my neck at the end there." Luna said as she pumped her fist in the air. "By the way you were going to tell me something about this Shampoo girl you're engaged to."

"Oh yeah I was going to tell you to watch out for her. She's got a curse like mine except that she turns into a little c..c..cat with white and purple fur and beads around her head. If you see her try to act like a normal cat ok?" Ranma said as he calmed down.

"Little cat, with white and purple fur and beads right?" Luna said.

"Yeah that's her. Also she's a pretty good fighter so I don't recommend fighting her."

Luna had a sinking feeling.

"Now hypothetically say I accidentally beat her in a fight..."

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Cologne, matriarch of the Chinese Amazons, had seen much in her three hundred years of life. Her great granddaughter in her cursed cat form tearing through the door, jumping into one of the customers ramen bowls to change back into a human and then rambling on about how she gave the kiss of marriage to a talking cat was fairly high up on the list of weird things that she'd seen happen.

After she'd led the still naked Shampoo up to her room and made her put on some clothes she managed to extract the whole story from her. After hearing that her grand daughter somehow got beaten by a talking cat that son in law was somehow not afraid of, she was going to give the kiss of death but accidentally gave the kiss of marriage. Cologne waited a whole thirty seconds before pulling out the strong herbs. She packed her pipe till it was pretty full and lit up.

Shampoo waited nervously until the elder was finished 'contemplating' her situation. Hopefully the elder in her mind expanded state would be able to find a solution for her problem. She didn't want to marry a cat. Finally after what seemed like forever Cologne spoke.

"I've got the munchies." She said as she turned and pogoed out of the room.

Shampoo slammed into the floor in a near perfect facefault. The elder was obviously no help so it looked up to her to figure this out. She walked over to her armoire and opened one of the drawers. There was no way she'd be married to a cat.

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Back at the Tendo home Ranma was lying on the ground groaning in pain. After finding out that Shampoo was going to give Luna the kiss of death but fucked up he couldn't hold in his laughter and fell out of the tree. Luna wasn't so amused with the situation. Once she found out that she'd accidentally been given a kiss that promised to track down and marry any who received it. Artemis would tease her to no end if he found out that she was married to a human girl. No the sooner she could speak to this Shampoo the better. Maybe since only the two of them knew well ok three of them if you included Ranma; they could come to some agreement that the whole incident never happened.

"I'm glad you take so much pleasure out of my suffering." Luna stated flatly as she jumped from the top of the tree and landed on Ranma's stomach.

"Glad to serve."

"Now what are we going to do about Shampoo?" Luna said as she lay down on his chest so that she could whisper.

"Well do you prefer a western or traditional style wedding? O oo Can I be best man! Maybe you can get your friends to be brides maids?" Ranma said trying to fake Minako's hyper blond style.

"I mean how do I get out of it!" Luna said digging all of her claws into his chest.

"Ow ow ow! Alright alright already." Ranma said as he held his hands up in surrender.

"Alright now what are we going to do?" Luna said as she relaxed her claws.

"Well as long as she hasn't told the old ghoul anything you should be fine." Ranma said.

"And if she has?" Luna said with a nervous sweat on her forehead.

"Traditional wedding." Ranma said as he flung Luna to the side and took off hoping to get away from her before she could retaliate.

"Get back here you!" Luna hissed as shouting would not have been a good idea with all the people around to here her.

A boy and his cat playing like two good friends.

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Suppertime finally arrived and the whole household was gathered around the table. Luna was seated between Ranma and Akane. Kasumi had even prepared a special meal just for Luna and even gave her her own pillow to sit on. Kasumi's idea of catfood was a perfectly cooked fish and minced beef with catmint jelly. Luna's opinion of Kasumi just kept going higher and higher.

Akane was keeping a wary eye on Ranma's cat. He'd told everybody how they met and how they'd traveled and trained together. She was still wary of the vicious cat and tried many times to switch places with Kasumi or Nabiki. Kasumi said that she would only switch if Akane promised to never cook again and Nabiki just flat out refused claiming that she was allergic to alley cats.

So Akane jumped and twitched every time Luna even made the hint of a threatening move. If she couldn't torment Akane physically she'd just have to mess with the girls mind a bit. Luna thought that she'd have cracked the girls mind in two days tops.

Once she'd finished her food, she'd forgotten Genma's penchant for stealing both hers and his sons food, she inched quietly as she could using all of her stealth techniques to remain undetected. Once she had reached her goal, directly behind Akane, she released her stealth and let out a huge

"Mrowr!"

The sight of Akane performing Ranma's patented cling to the ceiling technique was almost enough to make Ranma choke on his food. Nabiki just narrowed her eyes at the cat that seemed so out to torment her little sister.

"Now Luna that wasn't very nice..." Kasumi chided.

Luna lowered her head. Getting scolded by Kasumi just felt wrong.

"even though she deserves it for being mean to Ranma." She finished as she took a sip of her tea.

Everybody was stunned by Kasumi's statement. Akane especially as she let go of the ceiling and fell onto her back.

It was during this stunned break in conversation that one of the doors exploded off it's track. As long time residents, the household knew that Shampoo had just come for a visit. Ranma knew that it was Shampoo AND he knew exactly why she'd come. Luna of course just knew that somebody blew off the doors.

When the dust cleared Luna's eyes widened as she saw a young girl about Ranma's age with a quite impressive figure. In one hand she had a coloured bonbori which she had just used to knock down the door. In her other hand she held a metal thermos. For some reason (Ranma knew why) she looked quite pissed off.

"Where Airen?" Shampoo said as she stalked into the room.

Everybody pointed at Ranma except for Ranma who pointed at Luna.

Shampoo walked over to where Luna was sitting and opened the thermos. Luna having no idea what was going to happen just sat there. She was wondering who the girl was and what she had in the thermos. She quickly found out as the girl poured the entire contents on her.

Where there was once a little black cat there now sat a naked girl with black hair and a crescent moon on her forehead. She would have stood 5'1" or maybe 5'2". She had long toned sleek legs and arms. She had an impressive bust, not for it's size but perkiness factor. Luna of course summed up the entire experience with three eloquent words.

"What the Fuck!" She screamed as she tried to jump up. She ended up losing her balance and falling on her ass.

"Luna?" Ranma asked as he turned his head away. As a human Luna was definitely a looker.

"Talking kitty and Shampoo need talk now." Shampoo said as she grabbed Luna and started dragging her out of the room.

"Hey what are you!" Luna shouted as she attempted to throw the crazy girl.

Of course since she'd only had her human body for less than a minute she misjudged the toss and ended up slamming Shampoo into the far wall.

"Woah she's as strong as Akane." Ranma remarked briefly turning back to where Luna was.

"Will somebody just tell me why I'm human now!" Luna yelled as she finally got to her feet. She was wobbling back and forth.

"Well since we know that if that was real drowned girl water Shampoo would have used it on herself to get rid of her curse so we can assume that was the instant stuff." Nabiki said with a smile. "But as we all know Jusenkyo can alter form and personality but it can't alter intelligence." She smiled like a shark closing in for a meal. "Added to that the fact that Shampoo called you a 'talking kitty' and we are left with the fact that Ranma here owns a talking intelligent possibly magical cat." Luna slapped her hands over her mouth just now realizing her error. Ranma slapped his hand to his forehead in a classic 'Doh' maneuver. Nabiki shook her head. "Only you Saotome would get yourself a talking magical cat as a pet."

"Oh my Luna you really shouldn't go around naked like that, it's just not proper." Kasumi said as she put her hand to her mouth. Here I'll go get you some of Ranma's clothes." She said as she got up and went outside to get the clothes off the line.

Shampoo who had been playing possum so that she could get a better idea of the skill level of the cat decided that now would be a good time to voice her opinion.

"Shampoo kill!" She shouted as she dashed across the room and attempted to bash Luna.

Luna who was still not used to being human tried to dodge but she was going to be a second too slow in the maneuver. Ranma of course had noticed the way Luna was not too steady on her feet yet so as soon as Shampoo had yelled her battle cry he'd been in motion. He managed to scoop up Luna into his arms and bound out of the house before Shampoo's mace managed to connect. He snagged his clothes from Kasumi that's she'd been bringing in and jumped to the nearest roof Shampoo hot on his heels.

Having a squirming, naked, and generally distracting cat/girl in his arms just wouldn't do. He tossed Luna into the air and engaged the Nerima instant clothing technique. It was the same technique that his father, Mousse, Shampoo and Ryoga used to get dressed so they wouldn't be naked just after transforming.

"Ranma put me down I can run just fine!" Luna shouted. Being carried like a damsel in distress was not her thing.

"Normally that'd be true but take it from me it's not. You were having problems just standing up before it's going to take you some time to get used to walking on two legs." He shot back as he dodged a... teaspoon? Sakura must have heard the commotion and come out to see him carrying some girl away from Shampoo. "Right now we have to do the Saotome Final Attack and get away. Then you can practice walking." Ranma said as he dodged out of Ryoga's way as he too accidentally joined the chase.

Things kept getting better and better as Kuno saw Ranma carrying an attractive girl and decided that since the cursed Saotome was interested in her that he should 'save' her for himself.

"Curse you Saotome. Not only do you have the beauteous Akane Tendo and pigtailed girl, but now you also covet the wild crescent girl. Does your lechery know no bounds?" Kuno raved as he too took up the chase.

"I don't know Ranma does your lechery know no bounds?" Luna whispered in his ear right before she gave him a tender lick on his cheek.

Ranma stumbled and fell down into an alley. Luckily he managed to right himself and land on his feet. Quickly getting his bearings he spotted an open door and dove inside. He quickly but quietly shut the door and listened as the herd thundered past in search of him. Once he was certain that they'd gone he let out a huge sigh of relief.

Luna had to admit that this damsel in distress thing had it's advantages. It felt really great to be held against Ranma's muscled chest. Sure she'd been held like this in the past but she was just a little cat. Now that she was more proportionate it was a totally different experience. That added to the fact that she was human and certain things felt so different than when she was a cat. She now understood why girls liked this so much.

"So son in law this is the talking cat that my great grand daughter is now married to. I will admit that she is quite the looker." Cologne said in her raspy voice.

Authors notes:

Another chapter of Lunocracy done. I decided to end it here because it was getting pretty long. I am amazed by the number of comments I'm getting from this story. Most of the comments have been good encouraging me to continue although there have been a couple of flames. I originally intended it to be something light not serious at all. It was originally something that I would write every so often just to kill writers block. Some people critizised me saying that Ranma should get into sailor combat and that my comments that only magic could dammage a youma were incorrect. I take your points seriously and that may be the case, however this story is not about Ranma battling monsters. If I have my way (which I will b/c I'm the author) Ranma won't get involved with any of the monsters the sailors fight. If you want Ranma fighting monsters read Fast Tracks. (Yes BlueEsper I'm going to continue it no need for the umm persuasion.) I have a couple of more ideas for stories however I'm reluctant to start them b/c I already have quite a bit on my plate to take care of first. Maybe after I finish one of my stories I can start.

In other news I've caved in to the pressure and have re rolled Ranma's dragon form in Dragon's bane and I will be continuing it.

As always many thanks to my prereaders.

Lord Raa, Axekeeper, Chi Vayne, and KM

Without them you'd have to suffer through something written by a hack with bad grammer and an even worse sense of humour.


	5. Side Story 1

Lunocracy Side Story 1

I decided that since Sakura Ranma's other fiancée was a character that I made up it would be prudent to include some background on her. Hence this short little back story.

Side Story 1: Would you like Tea with that?

It had been about a year since Ranma and Luna were brought together and everything was going fine. Well as long as Ranma didn't get Luna confused with another cat. Both Ranma and Luna were progressing in the art at a phenomenal pace and Genma was patting himself on the back for his good job in training the two of them. Of course he never put it together that a cat would not have the intelligence to master even one move let alone scores of kata from different schools. Nobody ever said that Genma Saotome was an intelligent man. Usually the words Genma and intelligent tried to stay as far away from each other as possible as decreed by the court settlement and restraining order.

Two weeks ago they had encountered a father and his daughter along the road selling okonomiyaki.

Ukyo had been manning the grill prepping a couple of meals for her and her father for practice when she looked up to see a young boy about her age. He was very dirty like he hadn't had a bath in quite some time. His gi was quite dirty as well and had some unidentifiable stains on it. He had a black scarf tied over his head in a classical thief motif. She averted her eyes and pretended to not have noticed him and went back to work. She was of course keeping him in her peripheral vision just in case he tried something.

Sure enough when he'd reached optimal striking distance he waited for her to have her back turned and then he pounced. Unknown to him she'd turned around to give him the opportunity. In midair his face met with high carbon steel in a dazzling display of pyrotechnics that left him embedded upside down in a tree trunk with one of the two okonomiyaki that she was making hanging from his mouth. She quickly looked at the grill and confirmed that both of her okonomiyaki were gone. In the bushes Luna said a silent prayer for her diversion while she finished off her food.

"All right you jackass you're going to pay for stealing my food!" Little Ukyo roared as she attempted to 'fix' the little problem that had popped up in her life.

Ranma of course swallowed the last bit of the okonomiyaki he was eating and then using the tree as a lever flipped over the strike. Ukyo was of course livid and started chasing the boy all over the place. Ranma not wanting to hurt his new friend just decided to dodge and put in a comment here and there about hitting the broad side of Bhudda. Luna of course saw all of this and decided to take the initiative.

Both Genma and Ukyo's father Kentaro were watching off to the side as Ranma without hitting his daughter once won the fight. Kentaro was quite impressed with the boy's agility and speed which seemed almost unnatural for some reason he couldn't put his finger on. Well that and he was now sitting on top of his daughter who didn't have the strength to push him off.

"I do admit your boy is quite impressive but..." He was interrupted by a huge sneeze coming from Ukyo.

"Hey what's wrong?" Ranma asked as he looked down at the person under him.

"Achoo!" "There's got to be a cat around here somewhere! I'm Achoo allergic to cats." Ukyo said as her eyes started watering.

"Cats!" Ranma screamed as he jumped up and started looking around for the evil little buggers.

"My daughter is severely allergic to cats. You don't have one with you do you?" Kentaro said in a serious voice while glaring at Genma.

"Well there might be this flea bag that the boys kinda taken to." Genma hedged as he tried to figure out another angle to get his hands on the okonomiyaki cart but more specifically the food inside.

Ukyo took a sniff of Ranma and then sneezed.

"It's you!" She said then backed off. "Keep away from me."

"But I'm not! You take that back!" Ranma said just before he took a step forward.

He was cut off by his father appearing.

"Come on boy we're going."

"What? Why?" Ranma asked looking confused.

"Just get your stuff we're leaving."

"But..." He said dejectedly as his tail wagged back and forth in a sad manner.

"No buts just get going." Genma said as he shoved his son forward in an effort to get him to move faster.

"All right I'm going. Jeeze." Ranma muttered as he trudged forward.

Genma was trudging along behind Ranma. He was dejected for a completely different reason than his son. It had been his plan to auction off his son again and ransack the yattai for the food. It would have been enough to feed himself for a few days at least. He would have just told the boy it was a gift from his new friend. It was too bad the girl was allergic to that stupid cat of his sons.

When they arrived back at their camp Ranma noticed that his pack looked quite a bit bigger than before and had extra bags hanging off it. He looked over at Luna who had her halo out and wings on her back. The halo had some tarnish on it and the wings said "Made in Outer Bolivia".

"Ok Luna what's up?" Ranma questioned.

"Nothing let's just go." She hissed back jumping on top of his head.

"But what's with...?" Ranma said indicating his now much heavier pack.

"Training, training. Let's go come on chop-chop." She urged nervously looking behind her.

"Well if it's training..." Ranma said as he took her off his head and put her back on the ground.

Soon they were off with Luna and Ranma struggling to keep up. Ranma had tied several of the bags to her yet the shear mass of whatever was in the bags was impeding them.

Back at the Kuonji's camp Kentaro was swearing up a storm at the theft of almost all of the ingredients in their yattai. The thief whoever they were was good enough to cover all their tracks as only his daughters and a small animal's tracks were visible in the soft earth around the yattai.

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A few weeks later (well a few weeks of Luna hoarding her presssioussss) they arrived at a tea house in Ise. It was a very old building that had been used as a tea house for over 300 years to serve tea and snacks to weary travelers. Unfortunately Genma Saotome was not the first rogue that had passed through its doors nor would he be the last. Unfortunately he would be the most devastating, well at least to the youngest girl at the tea shop.

"Yashaimasen!" Little Sakura called out before she got a look at the two newest customers.

The older of the two was a dirty old man with a handkerchief on his head and a bad air around him. Sakura started waving her fan at him to try and push the stench back at him. Her impression of the old man was that he was a worthless thing that they were going to have to show the power of the Kuranai tea house martial arts on when he failed to pay for whatever he was going to order. Her eyes then caught the young boy that was trailing behind the older man. Her eyes lit up with joy. He was beautiful. Sure he was just as grubby as his supposed father and he had the same kind of handkerchief on his head but he had an air around him that spoke of an everlasting love between the two of them. Well that and he had the most adorable little black cat perched on his head like a hat.

Ranma who'd been walking behind his old man and not really paying any attention to what was around him suddenly felt a chill go up his spine. He quickly looked around but all he could see was a little girl in a kimono. He shrugged and ignored the feeling. His stomach gave a little growl as it hadn't been fed in over a day and a half. From the top of his head Luna's stomach also growled. Hers of course had been well fed over the last couple of weeks from the spoils of the yattai. She had shared some of the loot with Ranma as he'd played an excellent decoy.

"We'd just like some tea and manju buns." Genma said gruffly.

"That'll be 800 yen." Sakura said as she held out her hand expecting payment up front.

"Here you can hold the cat as a down payment." Genma said as he plucked Luna off Ranma's head by the back of her neck and plopped her down on Sakura. He then shuffled over to one of the sitting areas and plopped down causing some of the road dust to billow up from him spreading his stench a few tables downwind.

"Kitty!" Sakura gushed as she forgot all about the smelly old man in favor of the cute cat now in her arms.

"Where!" Ranma shouted as he started whipping his head around every which way trying to find the evil Cthulu sithspawn.

"Right here," Sakura said as she held up Luna.

"Whew." Ranma said obviously relieved. "That's just Luna. I can't understand why everybody keeps calling her a cat, she's a miniature Schrödinger's whale." Ranma shook his head at the stupidity of the girl. After all it was so obvious.

"Well she's still cute," she said as she put Luna on her shoulder and went to get the tea and buns. She also decided to get something for the theoretical quantum physics being purring up a storm on her shoulder. She guessed that both multidimensional whales and cats would both like fish so she went and got some.

After dropping the food off for the fat man she went over and started petting her collateral. Luna let out a yelp. Yes there is a wrong way to pet a cat and then there was the way Sakura was petting. She was going the opposite direction of the fur and adding little twists here and there for variety. This was pulling up Luna's fur and she was getting more and more ready to let blood flow.

Ranma had been watching this and noticed Luna's subtle (fiery red aura) signs that she was not enjoying the little girl's attention. He got up, forfeiting his tea and food. Genma had been waiting for just this opportunity. He knew that his weak son would go and try to save his cat. Honestly it was a weakness that he'd hoped he could cure his son of, although the thing was useful as a training aid. He contemplated this next set of training exercises while eating his son's manju bun.

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The Saotome's and Luna stayed in Ise for 3 weeks. During which time Ranma had to work to buy back Luna a sum total of 13 times when Genma used her as a bargaining chip. Unknown to Ranma Genma also engaged her to Sakura for money as the dowry. It all ended one day when Ranma came back to their camp to find Luna admiring herself in an old mirror.

"Uhh Luna whatcha doing?" He asked.

"Being vain," she replied as she struck a pose that made her look exceptionally good.

"Not to ask really but where'd you get the mirror?"

"I found it in a box in some shack just over there somewhere." She waved her paw in the direction of the main temple.

"Right. Umm I'm just going to ignore this now." Ranma said as he lay down on his sleeping bag and tried to ignore the goddess that was glaring down at Luna.

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They left soon after that. Sakura found out she was engaged to Ranma only after she'd told her parents that they'd left. Her parents didn't hold her to account for their foolishness and as such she never had to pretend to be a boy until she found vengeance or married Ranma. She eventually tracked him down when he settled in Nerima and took up where they left off. Ranma of course didn't confuse her gender so he likes her more than Ukyo who he would have confused for a male friend. However whenever she touches him she just seems to rub him the wrong way.

Authors Notes:

This is just a bit of quick interlude. Nothing special. I just figured that before I introduced Sakura in the story I should do a bit of back story to show how he met her and the situation. Remember this story is (was) just something to help me get going on my other stories. Unfortunately it's become too popular for me to just blow off as a junk story. Expect the next chapter of this soon. (Really)

As usual send feedback to go to melt cheese for poutine.


	6. Chapter 5

Lunocracy

Chapter 5 Catnip for Fun and Profit

Cologne just stood there staring at the tableau in front of her. Her son in law had just gotten himself into another interesting mess. Truthfully she highly doubted that he would marry her Shampoo. Although with this new development things had taken a strange twist into the truly bizarre. If she didn't find it so damned funny she'd probably have had an aneurysm by now. As it was it took most of her considerable willpower to not laugh at the stupid expression on son in law's face and the mirroring expression worn by his pet turned human. It was said that pets often look like their owners and now in this instant with the help of some instant powder that her great grand daughter had stolen she now understood this.

She idly noted the crescent moon mark on the girl's forehead. Somewhere in the back of her mind a neuron fired signaling a memory however that electrical connection had long since degraded. As such the proper memory from so long ago never surfaced. Couldn't have been important anyway. She watched as Ranma stood up supporting the girl on still wobbly legs. Cologne decided to play a bit with her daughter in law. She launched a slow strike towards her forehead. Well slow for Nerima standards. To everybody else it would have been at black belt level or higher. Instead of dodging or parrying the strike Luna grabbed the staff and using the momentum tossed the old woman across the restaurant. The toss allowed her to grab a pitcher of water and refill some of the customers glasses as she passed overhead.

"Very good daughter in law. I'm glad to see that you're adapting to being human this quickly. You certainly are a student of Anything Goes." Cologne chuckled as she pogoed back towards where Ranma and Luna were still standing.

"I'm not your daughter in law!" Luna yelled. "Honoured Old Ghoul." She thought to add at the end. It never hurt to be polite.

Whack.

Maybe it did hurt to be polite. Luna thought as she rubbed her head where Cologne's staff struck her head.

"So what my great granddaughter said was wrong? You didn't defeat her and then give her the kiss of marriage?" Cologne said as she pinned Luna with a stare that could have scared the dead.

"Well I thought she was a pampered cat and she was scaring Ranma." Luna said. "And it's not as if she wasn't trying to kill me... It's the thought that counts right?" She said hopefully.

"Sorry but you two got into liplock after you beat her. It doesn't matter what she was trying to do it's what actually happened that matters." Cologne said as she grinned some. Luna shuddered and wondered if she could round up the sailor scouts and somehow shoot this problem to death. She quickly dismissed it because they'd all get their asses collectively handed to them.

"So that means?" Luna said as she tried to figure a way out of this.

"Welcome to the family daughter in law." Cologne said as she hugged the stunned girl.

"Didn't we go through this already? I'm not your daughter in law!" Luna shouted.

The customers who were there were all staring at the situation. The cat cafe was often better than a soap opera what with all the convoluted romance situations and the great food to go with it. One guy in the back thought it was almost as good as Millways. Almost, but not quite.

"Of course you are. You are married to my great granddaughter by our laws. My great granddaughter is married to son in law by those same laws. Ergo you are married to son in law." She pulled out a party noise maker and blew it. The end uncurled and made a 'fweet' sound. "Congratulations." She said with a bow. She enjoyed yanking the younger generations proverbial chain just like hers was yanked when she was younger.

Mousse, who'd been listening in, decided that now since Cologne had connected the dots for him he should put his two cents in.

"Never! I'll never allow you to take my Shampoo from me you accursed woman!" He shouted while flinging a pot of hot water on to the trio.

Cologne of course dodged the water. Since it was hot water Ranma also was able to dodge. Luna however was a fraction of a second too late and as such got doused. She shrank back into her clothes as she returned to her cat form. Since this wasn't the first time she'd had to get out of a mountain of clothes (Usagi on laundry day) she made short work of the job and was soon free just in time to see Mousse gloating over her.

"Ha you're nothing. I have defeated the one who defeated Shampoo and am now her husband!" Mousse was gloating to the max. Finally Shampoo was his.

If Luna had been listening she would have heard that by defeating her she was free of Shampoo. Unfortunately she had inherited a bit of Ranma's selective listening skills. She only heard nothing and defeat before her mind turned red and all the hair on her body stood on end.

"Defeated my ass!" She yelled as she charged the still gloating boy fur, fangs and claws flying.

Mousse didn't have time to react as Luna grabbed his robes with her teeth and flung him across the restaurant to slam into the opposite wall. She followed up with a round house kick that smashed him out the front door and into the telephone pole across the street. This being Nerima it started raining for no apparent reason and Mousse became a duck. Luna not wanting to get wet again decided to wait for him to come back inside before she kicked his ass some more. True to form an enraged duck came storming back into the restaurant and immediately opened up with a hail of throwing knives all of which Luna deftly dodged. The customers behind her didn't need to dodge as Cologne and Ranma deflected the rest of the knives away from anybody important. However one customer lost his glass of water as a knife shattered his glass spilling the sparkling crystal clear and most importantly cold water all over a little black cat that was at the base of his table. Well, naked girl now but hey this was the Cat Cafe and this kind of thing was normal.

It wasn't normal for Luna though who was in the middle of a rising uppercut when she changed. Force and mass increased logarithmically and one duck went flying without the use of his wings. She wobbled a bit as she got used to standing on two legs again. She was greeted with cheers and applause from the crowd who thoroughly enjoyed the show. She whirled on Ranma.

"I thought you said it was temporary!" Luna shouted as she tried to make sense of what just happened. She'd changed back into a human without the instant powder.

"I thought so too. Old ghoul you got any ideas?" Ranma said as he turned just in time to get hit on the head with her cane.

She tossed Luna the clothes that were on the floor. This was not a strip bar after all. Hmm strip bar / ramen joint. It was worth a thought.

"It should have been." She lit up her pipe. "You are going to have to tell me some things."

"What if I want to remain in blissful ignorance?" Luna said as she was dreading both the questions and the possible answers to those questions.

"No deal." Cologne said as she hauled off Luna by the collar of her shirt.

"What about the customers?" Ranma asked.

A quick dousing of water and an apron thrown in his direction seemed to answer his question. He now she just sighed.

"Uhh sir... miss can I get another glass of water." The patron who'd had his glass broken asked hesitantly.

Ranma paused for a good 3 seconds before twisting her face into a good approximation of a smile.

"Right away, sir." She said as she scampered off to get the bloody annoying people their refills on waters, extra bowls of rice and curry, more noodles for their ramen. There was no such thing as a free lunch they said and it was oh so true as Ranma began working off his free lunches.

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In the back store room Cologne let go of Luna and backed up a bit. Luna just sat there on her haunches looking like a cat that was terribly annoyed with you for forgetting to put out her favorite cushion or bought a different kind of cat food they didn't like. If she had a tail it would have been waving around behind her angrily.

"Ok so I'm here what did you want to ask me about?" Luna asked as she tried to figure a way out of this situation that didn't involve her fighting the old woman or giving away any secrets that she didn't want out.

Cologne for her part just took a drag on her pipe and sat down on one of the crates to contemplate the situation. She just seemed to sit there and ever so often take a drag of whatever was burning in her pipe. Luna thought that the smoke was sweet smelling and vaguely purple in colour. This went on for a few minutes and the old woman looked as if she could just sit there all day. Luna on the other hand was a might bit more impatient.

"Will you just get on with it, will you?" She almost but not quite growled out.

To which she was responded to by being hit on her head with Cologne's +5 head seeking staff from the Tai Kwon Leap school of martial arts.

"You booted me in the head!"

"Quiet, you, I'm trying to concentrate here." She responded this time vocally. Her pupils seemed to be quite dilated and she had a hard time focusing on exactly where Luna was.

Luna returned to sitting there and looking dejected when she spotted something off to the side. It was an old box with weird markings on it. Of course she couldn't read what was on it but she was curious none the less. With the old woman vegetating off to the side she decided to do a little snooping. She carefully crept over to the crate and opened the lid. Inside were three items. A ball of string, a cat's collar and a bottle of old Janx Spirit. The cat's collar had a strange crystal dangling where the name tag should be. She picked up the collar and had a weird feeling of nostalgia like a memory that almost but wouldn't quite surface. It was a pretty collar and she wouldn't mind wearing it but it was way too small for her human form. She hoped Cologne would be able to figure out why she was still affected by this curse. It wasn't because she hated being human per se, it was just that it would be a trifle inconvenient to change in front of, well anybody. She'd be embarrassed to be naked a condition that until now hadn't really bothered her. Maybe she could learn a martial arts technique that would allow her to carry a set of clothes with her at all times and maybe that speed dressing thing that Ranma had done.

As a typical cat she had a rather short attention span and after pocketing the three items, a habit she'd gotten into during her travels, she turned her attention to something else. That something else turned out to be the bleary red eyed Cologne who'd gotten right up in her face. Startled Luna jumped back and almost knocked over some crates. After getting her heart rate back under control she decided to risk a question.

"Umm so have you figured it out yet?" Luna asked hopefully.

"You're a magical talking cat." Cologne said as if she was only realizing it for the first time.

"Of course I'm a magical talking cat what else could I be." She paused. "Well ok I'm a cursed magical talking cat. Now you're going to tell me how to get uncursed."

"Stop being a magical talking cat." Cologne said as she pulled again on her pipe.

"That's crazy! i can't just say one day 'Oh me Oh my I don't want to be a magical talking cat anymore and just stop! That's like stopping breathing!"

"That'd work too."

"So you're saying that my magic is powering the temporary curse making it semi permanent." Luna said as she slumped down.

"No."

"What?"

"No. Your curse is permanent and is being powered by the great banana! All praise the banana!" Cologne said standing up suddenly then falling down.

"Right of course. How silly of me." Luna deadpanned as she turned to leave.

"Say hello to the princess and her 8 little dwarves for me!" Cologne called out as Luna left the room.

Luna face of course was distracted so much by this statement that she missed the ground in the middle of her facefault.

"Hey, I'm flying!"

Of course if you ever find yourself flying this way never ever think about it.

Luna thought about it.

And promptly crashed back to the ground

Cologne was no where near the ground in her own mind either.

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As Luna walked back into the restaurant, a bit steadier on her feet than she was before, she saw Ranma in his female form flitting between tables waiting on customers. Deciding to sit down at a booth she soon found a glass of water and a menu in front of her. She looked up and found Ranma halfway across the restaurant tending to another customer. She'd already eaten Kasumi's supper so she really wasn't all that hungry.

"What can I get you today ma'am?" Ranma asked in a strained cheerful voice.

"I'll have an order of soup." Luna said. Ranma's head snapped up and she actually looked at who she was serving.

"Oh hey, Luna. Sorry didn't recognize you there. We don't have any soup." She stated factually. Cologne wasn't in the kitchen and she really didn't feel like cooking. Mousse was still out like a light and Shampoo was out somewhere looking to kill Luna.

"That's fine I guess." Luna sighed as she looked at the cool glass of water on the table.

"How about some hot water?" Ranma offered as she pulled a carafe out of the apron's pocket.

Luna's eye twitched.

"How did you do that?" Luna asked pointing at the pot.

Ranma scratched her chin. "Well first you heat the water then you..." She was interrupted by Luna hauling her off her feet and holding her in the air with one hand.

"What I meant was how did you pull that out of that little pocket!" Luna yelled.

"Umm excuse me miss..." one of the customers piped up. "I believe I can answer that. It's what's called Hidden Weapons. It's an amazon technique that allows the user to hold an indeterminate amount of things on their person without outwardly showing it." He finished.

Luna boggled at this for a minute.

"And just how do you know that!" She screamed. "Isn't it supposed to be secret or something?"

"Well it is. Sorta." The man said taking a sip of his tea. "But I showed Mousse a few things and he showed me how to do it."

"Showed him things like what?" Ranma asked. Better to find out Mousses new moves before he got caught by them.

"Why this! Fist of the white swan!" The man shouted and attempted to bean Ranma with a training potty.

Of course Ranma had seen this stupid technique before and easily caught the training potty mid swing.

"Revised!" The man shouted as he let go of the training potty and ducked under the table just as the digital timer where the plastic duck's eyes should have been hit 00.

The mouth opened and a tinny speaker quacked out "Hasta la vista baby." right before it exploded sending Ranma right out the front door and into the wall across the street.

The charge was shaped in such a way that the blast was mostly concentrated forward. As such Luna who was standing off to the side was unscathed. After just seeing her friend blasted by high explosives she snapped and decided to do something about it.

"Who are you?" She asked warily.

"I am Kenshiro Tanwaka of the training potty school of martial arts!" He declared proudly while holding up a plastic duck shaped training potty.

"Right just so I know who's ass I'm going to kick." She stated right before she carried through with said act.

"All right everybody leave all your money on the table take your food and get out!" Luna yelled.

The customers grumbled but stayed put.

"Now! Before I have to get violent." She growled out as she cracked her knuckles.

The restaurant was cleared in a matter of seconds. All the plates that still had food on them were taken with the customers but there were several piles of money on the tables. She went around and collected the money and pocketed it. She'd have to add it to her stash back at Usagi's place. She sighed as the fact that her curse was permanent sunk in a bit further.

"Oh well, I didn't really want that diamond studded cat collar anyway." Luna sighed as yet another dream went poof on her.

She closed the door on the restaurant and using a trick that Genma taught them she locked the door from the outside. She walked across the street and lifted Ranma up on to her shoulder. She boggled for a moment at how light he felt to her. Normally she would have to struggle to move him but now it felt like he hardly weighed anything. Maybe turning into a human had its advantages after all.

Thirty seconds later she thought differently as she struggled to get out from underneath Ranma as a stray hot water bottle had come out of nowhere and broke over her head turning him male and her into a cat.

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It was late at night when Luna finally finished dragging Ranma's still inert form back to the dojo. He may have been knocked out initially but somewhere during their little trip back he'd fallen asleep and wouldn't wake up. Luna made sure to drag him over as many curbs as possible in an attempt to either wake him up or punish him for making her drag his stupid ass home. Once she got him through the front gates she decided that was good enough and left him there. She continued up to the dojo and laid down and went to sleep.

She was woken up the next morning by the sweet sound of mortal combat emanating from the koi pond area. Since it had been a long time since she'd last been with Ranma she'd lost her ability to sleep through just about anything. As such it was a very cranky kitty that walked out of the dojo to observe the morning sparring between Ranma and his panda father. Ranma had of course knocked Genma into the pond first and as such gained a speed advantage on his father. Luna watched for a few minutes before Kasumi called everybody in for breakfast.

Once everybody had been seated at the table, and Ranma had proceeded to demolish his food, Luna decided to get some revenge for having to drag Ranma home last night. She quietly snuck around behind him making sure to use all of her stealth techniques that she had at her disposal. Out of the corner of her eye she noticed that that Akane girl had followed her movements. The techniques she knew only worked if somebody didn't see you in the first place, they were ineffective if somebody saw you and was tracking your movement. She wondered if Ranma had learned any new techniques he'd be willing to share with her.

Ranma was no where near as oblivious of Luna as she hoped. He had to admit that she wasn't slacking off and had actually improved quite a bit from when he'd last seen her. However he'd been attacked almost constantly by high caliber martial artists that used similar techniques. As such he'd been forced to develop counters for their techniques and new techniques of his own to get away from the horde when he needed time alone. He'd detected her intent was violence on his person even though she was suppressing her aura. As such he was ready for almost anything she could throw at him.

Well almost anything.

Akane had been tracking Luna ever since she started her little jaunt to punish her fiancee. She was still upset over the fact that she lost to a bloody cat of all things. Here she was the best fighter in Nerima and she lost to Ranma's pet. Granted said pet was a magical cat but still. Her pride was gravely wounded and as such demanded vengeance. She'd gone up to the attic and dug up a couple of old water guns that she and Nabiki used to play with when they were kids. Nabiki's was the only one that still worked as she took care of her toys. It was a fact that was still true today. Akane was just hard on her things and as such they didn't last very long.

None of that mattered at this moment because in the here and now she was finally going to get her revenge on that walking talking ball of fur. Luna had just set herself up for a classic dash and pounce maneuver and was preparing for launch. Akane readied her instrument of choice.

The next series of events happened in apparent slow motion, also known as bullet time. Luna started her charge completely dropping all pretense of stealth as she channeled ki to her limbs to give her more speed and strength for the upcoming thrashing she was going to unleash on her friend for making her work unnecessarily hard dragging him home last night. Ranma felt Luna's sudden surge of ki and turned around to intercept her incoming attack. Akane aimed and fired when Luna was in mid jump. Predictably Luna turned female much to the astonishment of everybody at the table. Notably Luna and Ranma were the most surprised by this but not for the reasons that most would assume. Luna had been hoping that last night was just a dream and that she wasn't really permanently cursed to become human. She found herself naked and flying through the air towards Ranma. Ranma was surprised because he was expecting an attack from Luna a little talking space dog with a time dilation problem. What he got was a 55 kilo girl... check that 55 kilograms of naked girl.

Because of the sudden change in mass and distribution of said mass Ranma was not braced properly to meet this new attack. The two of them tumbled backwards onto the table spilling food and drinks left and right. Miraculously Ranma didn't get a drop of cold water on him. What wasn't so miraculous was the fact that when this catastrophe subsided Luna was positioned on top of Ranma, his arms had automatically encircled her to try and catch her which had been his original plan. And since this was Ranma he and Luna had ended up in liplock.

The rest of the occupants at the table froze in shock at seeing what had happened. Ranma couldn't for the life of him focus the will to push Luna off him and Luna being too stunned by her first human kiss didn't realize that she should probably be getting off right about now. Having many more nerve endings and an entirely different set of hormones threw her for a loop. The tableau lasted for about 3 minutes before Kasumi decided to break things up.

"Ranma if you want to have bestial relations with your pet please do not have them at the table."

Both Ranma and Luna broke liplock and looked straight at Kasumi then turned back and looked at each other. The resulting vortex that was spawned created a category 5 tornado which wiped out the budding civilization that had been born of Akane's attempt at ravioli a few nights previous. It wasn't much of a loss as this civilization would have been wiped out in a few more days by her attempt at ramen when trying to outdo Shampoo.

"Ahh, it wasn't what it looked like." Ranma said as he scratched the back of his head sheepishly.

"It looked like you were making out with your pet cat on our table while we are trying to eat breakfast, Ranma baby." Nabiki pointed out while pushing herself away from the table. She'd just lost her appetite.

"How many times do I have to tell people Luna's not a ..." He was cut off from his rant by Soun.

"Son! How dare you cheat on my daughter with this admittedly attractive animal!" Soun bellowed hoping that if he yelled loud enough they would just collapse to his will.

"What I'd love to know is how you changed. I don't think my little sister recently got in any drowned girl water." Nabiki said as she studied the situation. Visions of yen dancing in her field of vision as she contemplated money making situations that she could get the cat to dance on a hot tin roof.

Luna turned towards the middle daughter. She narrowed her eyes before responding. "My magic is powering the temporary curse making it permanent. If you think of making me pose for any of your little photo shoots I'll make sure that all your clothes are well ventilated." She raised her hand and tried to bring out her claws forgetting that she wasn't a cat at the moment.

"Idle threats kitty cat. Oh and by the way..." She raised her hand as well, however Nabiki's hand had a camera in it. One flash later she lowered it. "We humans like to cover our nakedness. It's just one of the strange quirks we have that separates us from the mere beasts of the world. " She said as she got up from the table and grabbed her bag.

"EEp!" Luna squeaked out as she finally realized that she'd been naked through the entire conversation and that she was supposed to be embarrassed by it now.

"You can borrow my clothes." Ranma said. "They're in the closet." He said getting up. "I'm off for school." He said before starting to move off.

It was about this time that Akane's pervert meter came down from being pegged and her brain registered that her unwanted fiancee had been having wanton sex in the middle of the breakfast table with his pet cat. This realization set off automated responses that had been hard wired into her over the years. First of all her aura flared mauve and melted her hair pins. This would lead to a massive comb over later when she had to shave her hair in those areas to get them out of her hair. Next came her withdrawal of her mallet from her personal stuff space. It was the titanium alloy that she had built for her by some golf club manufacturer so she could get better distance in her drive. It was of course painted red as her namesake. The next was to yell out a battle phrase.

"Ranma Saotome because of you I've seen Hell!"

Nobody ever said she had to yell out her battle phrase. :)

The final thing was to hit Ranma up, up, and away.

As the rest of the household watched with apparent disinterest in the latest Akane related outburst one person was looking on with contempt. Luna had decided that she would break Ranma from this abusive person who didn't know how to pet right and set him up with someone better. An image of Kasumi petting her came to mind and she tried to purr at the thought but all she got was a hacking cough.

When she'd gotten to the room that Ranma shared with his father she noticed one thing. She would have to wear Ranma's clothes. That included his underwear. She blushed heavily at this but for the life of her she couldn't understand why. Ranma was just her friend. Hell she'd regularly slept in his dirty clothes because it was more comfortable than sleeping on the ground. That and they had his scent on them and she felt reassured that she could have his smell around. Now just the thought of wearing his clean clothes sent a rush of heat to her cheeks. It was a strange sensation that she didn't know if she liked or not. Fortunately she was saved at the last moment by Kasumi.

"Luna-chan you don't have to wear Ranma's clothes those are boys clothes. Come we'll get you something to wear." Kasumi said as she gently took Luna's hand and led her out of the room.

"You could always get me some hot water and I can change back." Luna said as she tried to gently extract her hand.

"Oh no, that won't do at all. Akane's clothes should fit you. Come on I'll help you." Kasumi said as she increased the pressure on Luna's hand and dragged the now struggling Luna into the room. Luna wasn't using her full strength as she didn't want to hurt the nice girl.

When the massacre was over Luna found herself dressed in a pair of hot pink coveralls with the word china written across the front, a cream coloured shirt, ankle socks, bra, panties, makeup and some clip on ear fobs to try and cover up the fact that part of her ear was missing. She admitted to herself at least that she looked quite attractive for a human however her pride would never let her admit it.

"How does everything fit?" Kasumi asked. She'd had so much fun dressing up Ranma and now she had a real well female at least to play with. She'd grown so lonely during the day with nothing really to do except work.

"It's too tight in the chest." She said squeezing said area. "And it's way too loose in the hips." She said while tugging them to indicate how loose they were.

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This familiar scene triggered an automatic response in Akane who was no where near the scene and couldn't hear what was being implied about her physical structure. As Ranma went sailing out the window his mind was trying to figure out just what the hell he did now.

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"Well yes, my little sister is a bit flat chested and yes she has quite a bit of junk in the trunk but she does mean well." Kasumi said trying to defend her little sister but unintentionally insulting her in the process.

"Well yeah, I guess I'm built a bit better than you humans but I don't know. Wearing clothes just isn't my thing." Luna said trying to get Kasumi to relent and allow her to change back."

"Nonsense we humans are the dominant life form on this planet." Kasumi said with a little satisfaction.

"Actually humans are third on the list of intelligent species. Mice are first followed by dolphins then humans." Luna said remembering all the mice she'd eaten. Smug little bastards they were too.

"Really? Mice?" Kasumi asked as she couldn't comprehend it.

"Yeah well they don't like to advertise the fact but yeah mice rule the world." Luna said trying to get off the subject.

"Hmm that's interesting." Kasumi said thinking about it for a sum total of 30 seconds before she decided to move on.

"So come on let's go shopping!" Kasumi said excitedly. Her sisters had long since grown tired of shopping with her and now went with their friends.

"Shopping?" Luna asked. Sure she'd gone shopping with Usagi and the rest of the scouts but for the life of her she couldn't understand what all the fuss was about.

"Of course shopping. Akane has horrible taste in clothes and now that you're human you're going to need some." Kasumi said as she gently petted Luna's head like she were still a cat. It worked and Luna started leaning into the strokes. "Let's go." Kasumi said as she grabbed her hand and started pulling her out the door.

"Wait up, I've got to get something!" Luna said as she used her strength and broke the hold.

She then dashed to the guest room and raided the money she'd gotten last night at the nekohanten, she then raided Genma's stash of money. The stupid moron still kept it in the same place as when they were traveling. She knew where it was because she'd seen him go to it when he thought she was the only one looking. That'll teach him to never trust a cat. Finally she decided that she still didn't have enough money so she decided to raid Ranma's stash. After all he owed her for last night's taxi service.

When she was finished she had quite a stack of notes. Granted most of them were only 1000 yen bills but it still felt like a lot of money. She ran out of the room and jumped off the top floor and landed by the table. She then turned and sprinted towards the door where she knew Kasumi would be waiting for her.

"I'm ready to go now." Luna said as she bounced up and down on the balls of her feet. Maybe this shopping thing could be fun as she remembered that every shopping trip the girls went on usually consisted of eating large amounts of mall junk food, which they told her since she was a cat couldn't have.

Mirimachi shopping arcade food court vendors beware Ranma isn't the only one who can pack food down his legs and into other dimensions.

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It took them a while to arrive as some pervert tried to grope Luna on the train. It took her about a minute to figure out that what he was doing was wrong since when she was a cat she'd normally love somebody petting her butt. When she remembered that this was not acceptable human behavior she politely corrected the deviant on his social gaff by shoving his head through one of the windows. Of course it wasn't open at the time. Nor was it meant to ever open. Kasumi of course had to comment on her form and the fact that she should have used a mallet instead of damaging JR property.

The Mirimachi shopping arcade was a garish 13 story tall mecca of consumerism. It was located in southern Nerima so there were quite a few stores that were dedicated to that sort of lifestyle. As indicated by their first stop on this little marathon.

"Takono's Mallets' R Us?" Luna asked as she stared at the sign. Sure Kasumi had extolled the benefits of carrying a mallet to deal with perverts but she still couldn't understand. After all she had these martial arts to deal with perverts.

"Oh my, yes this is where Akane buys all of hers. She tends to go through about one a month." Kasumi said as she pulled out her own small mallet from her purse. "I can't do hammerspace so I have to carry mine around in my purse."

Kasumi's mallet was fairly small, about the size of a child's toy mallet. It was painted black with a yellow smiley face on one side and a flaming skull on the other. Surprisingly enough Luna found herself drawn to it. She wanted to hold it. She wanted to caress it. She wanted to hit somebody.

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Genma sneezed violently.

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"Ok, maybe this won't be so bad after all." Luna said as she allowed herself to be dragged into the store.

The walls of the store were lined with racks upon which every conceivable form of mallet could be hung from. They were even hanging from the ceiling. There were shelves crammed with them. Most were wooden, some were rubber, others were composite fiber for the more delicate lady. Then there was Luna's mallet. It only took her a few seconds to spot as it was contained in a Plexiglas case with a spotlight illuminating it gently from above and another below giving it an ethereal glow. Luna immediately made a beeline for it but was stopped by the velvet rope that was encircling the enclosure so that prospective buyers didn't slobber all over the case.

The mallet itself was all black it didn't look like paint but rather some kind of black metal. The handle was covered in some kind of molded rubber with finger grips. On the pedestal Luna noted the composition of the mallet. The inner core was made of einsteinium while the outer shell was made of titanium, lead, mithryl, and the souls of the damned while the shaft was carved out of a solid piece of Yggsdrail.

The price was almost as horrendous as the composition suggested. That was a lot of zeros. Luna was just about to turn away when a saleswoman appeared right beside her. She was wearing a nice casual female suit with a grey skirt and jacket. She was smiling almost to the point of hurting herself.

"I see the young madame has great taste in mallets. This is our best model and we've sold quite a few of these." She said effectively lying through her teeth. They'd bought this monstrosity but they had to charge so much that nobody ever bought it. Only lookers.

"Well it is a bit out of my price range..." Luna started.

"Well then you're in luck we're having a 50 off sale on this item." The clerk said in a rush. Sure it was an attention getter but it was taking up valuable shelf space that could be used elsewhere.

"I really don't know." Luna hedged as she started doing mental calculations. "How about 60 off and you throw in a free engraving." Luna said as she suddenly turned the tables on the sales woman.

The woman winced as that much of a discount would take it well below their cost, never mind the cost to have the bloody thing engraved. However they'd just gotten a new shipment of prada mallets and they needed the floor space for something that would be a much better seller.

"Deal. What would you like engraved in it?" The woman said as she tried not to wince.

Luna lifted her hair revealing the crescent moon symbol underneath.

"I'd like this on the side here." Luna said as she pointed at the side.

"Of course. Now your method of payment?" The woman asked.

"Cash of course." Luna replied as she and Kasumi walked up to the cash register to complete the transaction.

Once Luna had paid and the employee had taken a picture of the crescent moon for the engravers they left the shop. Luna had not done her calculations anywhere near right (well she is a cat) and it had ended up costing her way more than she'd bargained for. As such she was a little low on cash at the moment. This situation was easily remedied as she and Kasumi walked around. A few registers that weren't monitored by cameras became a few thousand yen lighter a few obscenely rich perverts conveniently misplaced their wallets and one baby lost its candy.

Kasumi was wondering where Luna got the lollipop because she couldn't remember the cat girl ever stopping to buy one. She of course never noticed her swipe a few others from a candy store that they visited. Being a student of Saotome school of Anything Goes meant being a master thief. Ranma used to be better than her at it of course since he had the advantage of opposable thumbs and pockets in which to hide merchandise but not anymore.

"Hey we need to go here." Kasumi said as she dragged Luna towards a strange shop.

"What's in here?" Luna asked apprehensively.

"Underwear of course. Since you can't go around borrowing Akane's all the time we need to get you some of your own."

"But it's so constricting and when I change it's just one more thing to drag with me." Luna sulked as she remembered changing last night and her having to struggle out of just the shirt. It was not a pleasant experience.

"You can't go around without a bra or panties on." Kasumi admonished the girl. "You'll attract perverts left and right. Look at Ranma."

"I haven't really seen the perverts that he attracts but if that guy on the train this morning was any indication I guess I'd better." Luna said as she reluctantly followed the older girl into the store.

After about half an hour of embarrassment in which Luna tried on several different pairs of bra's before she found one that wouldn't constrict her when she changed they left with a couple of small bags. Luna wanted to go to a clothing store but Kasumi wanted to look at another store first.

Why oh why did it have to be a fur shop?

"Oh my Luna don't you think this looks pretty?" Kasumi said as she held up a cat fur shawl.

"MURDEROUS HEATHEN!" Luna shouted as she attempted to kill all the infidels.

Once Kasumi had managed, with the help of 15 very nice and helpful security guards, to drag Luna away from the store she decided that maybe the thought of a human cat wearing fur wouldn't be so cute after all.

The next stop was the China Lily dress shop on the fourth floor. Coincidentally it's where Shampoo gets all her dresses from. Luna had calmed down considerably from her little outburst earlier and this shop would be the start of her understanding of the human female's brain into the art of shopping. The first thing she noticed was a beautiful dress that had a roaring tiger embossed around it. The dress itself was black silk so the tiger motif really stood out. It had collar buttons that went down the shoulder with little chrysanthemums. That and it was short. Quite short.

"Oh my Luna it's beautiful. You have to get it." Kasumi gushed.

"I don't know. I do like it. But it's just..." Luna stalled.

Kasumi grabbed Luna's shoulders and turned her to face her. She looked her directly in the eyes. "You have to buy that dress it would be a crime not to."

"Actually it would be a crime if I swiped it." Luna muttered under her breath before shifting her eyes to the side. She turned back towards Kasumi and gave her a smile that she once gave a mouse before she pounced. "I'll do it but on one condition."

Kasumi and Luna stepped out into the mall. Both were carrying several large bags with neatly folded dresses in them. Luna was strutting along in her new tiger dress while Kasumi was trying to hide behind her in her new dragon dress. It was a twin of Luna's except it was red with a swirling Chinese dragon spiraling around it. All the male eyes in the place tracked them. Those that hadn't seen them yet were tapped on the shoulders or arms and pointed in their direction.

"You're right, Kasumi, I don't feel like a pervert magnet at all." Luna said happily as she bounced along not noticing the stares upon her person. After all a cat must be the center of attention.

"I think we should go eat now." Kasumi said glancing at her watch and wondering when she could go and change back to her normal dress. She wasn't used to this much male attention.

"You just said the magic words." Luna said as this time she grabbed Kasumi's hand and started running.

The shopping arcade that they were in had several elevators that went between the floors and escalators as well. They were currently on the 4th floor and the food court was on the 13th floor. The elevators were too inconvenient and the escalators just took way too much time. The designers of the building decided to splurge and had a small open air atrium type skylight with a vertical column going straight down to the basement to utilize natural light to save power. Of course there were openings on each floor where people could look down or up. And there were hand rails to keep people on the proper side of the barrier.

Of course Luna wouldn't take the easy way. Spectators were treated to the sight of yet another martial artist using the "express elevator to hell" as some of the merchants called it. Kasumi who'd never traveled this way before was understandably frightened out of her mind. The only thing keeping her from falling was the iron grip Luna had on her hand. If she wasn't made of sterner stuff the constant jerking would have torn her arm out of its socket long ago as Luna triangle jumped between the levels. So incensed was she that she didn't even think about all the perverts below that were getting essentially a free peek at her panties.

When they landed it was Kasumi who looked like she was out of breath. Her chest was heaving doing quite a few interesting things to her dress and her eyes were wide. She had a death grip on the table that Luna sat her at.

"Ok you just stay there and I'll get us some food." Luna said as she gave Kasumi a little pat on her bone white hand.

Let the carnage begin!

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The food court vendors were bombarded by this cute black haired girl who swooped down upon them like an eagle grabbed a bunch of things then paid and swooped away to the next victim. She left in her wake a bunch of stunned hormonal boys who never even noticed that there were several things missing. It was quite a sight this little girl darting about balancing trays in both her arms and on top of her head. Piles of food getting steadily bigger as she hopped from place to place.

When she arrived back at the table Kasumi had regained some semblance of control over her emotions. That was until she saw what Luna had gotten for lunch.

"Luna chan are you sure you can eat all that? I mean you're not Ranma."

"Course I can." Luna said proudly. "But as a cat I'm supposed to be discrete about what I eat. I mean the Tsukino's would have a fit if I ever ate as much as I wanted to, but as a human I can stuff myself and nobody will think a thing of it!"

"Except that you're a pig." Kasumi stated under her breath.

"What was that?" Luna said as she saw Kasumi's lips moving but couldn't hear what she'd said.

"Oh nothing. What did you get for me?" Kasumi said as she looked over the spread wondering not for the first time today where the little cat got all her money from. Well she was a magical cat so maybe she created it from magic.

"Here you go. I know you like this kind of thing so I got you some." Luna said as she handed over a bowl of deluxe ramen to the older girl.

"Banzai!" Luna said as she dove face first into her food.

"Luna you have hands now use them please!" Kasumi almost shouted, mortified that the girl was still eating like a cat would.

Luna lifted her head from her food her face still surprisingly clean. She used her tongue to lick her lips just like a cat would. It took her a minute to realize Kasumi had said something about hands. She looked at her hands mystified like she'd never seen them before. Then her face lit up like a monkey touching a black monolith.

"Thank you very much Kasumi." Luna bowed. "You have been most helpful in teaching me how to be human."

Kasumi looked on with pride as she was able to help Luna accept her humanity better.

"Now I can eat much faster." Luna said as she picked up the food with her hands and started shoveling it into her mouth at breakneck speeds. It was a lot messier than her normal method of eating but if this was how humans did it. When in Rome.

(Luna is usually eating on the floor and can't see them using chopsticks at the table as it's too high and in the bush both Ranma and Genma usually ate food with their hands.)

Kasumi just sat there stunned.

When Luna had finished she licked her fingers clean. She would be purring if she still could. As it was she had a glow about her. As finally something that she'd wanted for so long had finally been satisfied.

"I'm finally full!" She shouted. Her hands raised in triumph.

"Woop dee doo." Kasumi said through half lidded eyes.

"Ok, now we can go do some more shopping!" Luna stated unconsciously striking one of Usagi's favorite poses.

"Ok, I know this little shop that sells the most adorable jewelry and then we still need to get you some formal wear and..." Kasumi started rattling off all the places that she'd like to go.

"Ok ok. But first I need some ice cream." Luna said as she picked up all the bags in one hand and effortlessly strode off to get some cat mint ice cream. It's too bad she didn't turn around as she would have been treated to an extremely rare site of Kasumi absolutely losing it.

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Because of her lunch Luna had to stop off at some ATS (automated teller stores) and pick up some money. Their next stop was a store that specialized in fighting clothes. These clothes were made of sterner stuff than most because they had to withstand lots of punishment at the hands of their wearers and the ones that were trying to kill their wearers. As such the store was fairly busy even though it was a school day. Since Kasumi regularly shopped here with Akane she knew her way around. The first thing she did was go to the heavy silk section. It was full of Chinese tangs that looked like Ranma's except that they were in many different colours other than red.

"Ranma kun says that these last the longest of all the clothes but they are a bit pricey." Kasumi said as she mentally tried to imagine Luna in one of them.

"I don't know they are a bit well much, and I really don't think I'll be doing much fighting other than pounding on lard ass or with Ranma." Luna replied as she tried to imagine herself in one of these and succeeded in part. She imagined Usagi with a long warrior braid fighting off youma left right and center. Of course the imagined Usagi promptly degraded into reality as she fell on her face and started bawling her eyes out.

"I think I'll just get a few of these over here." Luna said as she pointed at a rack of discount merchandise.

All of the clothes on the rack looked very good. They were all in mint condition and looked sturdy enough. However they all had little tags on them detailing the problems with them. A nice heavy cotton/canvass/leather combo had the warning that it got very hot and sweaty and that the user was warned about overheating. A nice synthetic nylon/spandex body suit had the warning that it didn't provide any protection at all. Another synthetic caught fire when exposed to ki blasts and tended to melt to skin. A piece of body armor that looked suspiciously like the sailor scouts uniform noted that the stupid bows could be removed and used to strangle the user by the opponent. An experimental garment noted that it tended to self destruct at random intervals when the embarrassment quotient reached maximum to only further embarrass the user.

After looking through the racks she grabbed a battle bikini, the body suit, and the Mei costume from King of Fighters. It was on her way to pay for the items that she noticed something out of the corner of her eye. First of all it was leather, it was shiny, it was form fitting, it had little metal pyramid studs in all the right places, it was the last one, and it wasn't in her size.

"Oh my, that would look umm good on you." Kasumi said as her sense of modesty was thrown for a loop.

"Yeah it would I guess. It's just it's not in my size." Luna said as she grabbed it anyway.

"But I thought it wasn't in your size?" Kasumi said as she tried to figure out why Luna would want to buy it if she couldn't wear it.

"It's a present for a friend of mine." Luna said as she thought of the one girl who could wear this and enjoyed fighting. "Come to think of it I should get presents for all the girls."

"Oh my, I don't know how a cat could wear this." Kasumi said trying to figure out exactly what a cat could do with it.

"Oh no, I've got several human friends. One of them has a figure that would really stretch this out plus she loves fighting and cooking too." Luna said as she tried to think of what to get the other girls.

"Is she any good?" Kasumi asked.

"Well she's about your skill in cooking but only around a black belt in karate so she sucks there." Luna said as she remembered fighting the girl one on one once. Still she was the best fighter the scouts had so she had to do.

"So she's not engaged to Ranma, then?" Kasumi said hopefully. A girl like that would prove serious competition for her little sister.

"Probably not. Unless he's her 'sempai' she's always talking about but can never seem to remember." Luna said hoping this outfit would finally get the girl some so she'd shut up about it.

"Ahh. Do you know if any of your friends are engaged to Ranma?" Kasumi said as they were walking to the counter. "Uncle Saotome was quite liberal when he was planning for Ranma's future." Communist would be more like it. Everybody got a piece.

"I don't think so, but I'll have to look into it now that you mention it." Luna replied noting that she never did get the girls to find out if their parents had been swindled into some kind of engagement. She didn't remember any of their family names but there was a lot of time that the old lard ball spent in bars.

"It would be unfortunate if Ranma turned out to have any more suitors. Akane can get quite jealous." Kasumi said with some concern.

When Akane got jealous she tended to try to be domestic. This included cooking after which Kasumi would have to clean the kitchen, buy new pots/pans/knives/stoves, and care for a deathly ill Ranma. She also tended to destroy things like bricks and training dummies and roofs which was Nabiki's domain to pay for repairs and supplies. In short another fiancee for Ranma would be disastrous for the Tendo finances.

"Pfft. That girl doesn't deserve him. I really don't like her that much." Luna responded in true feline fashion. If she didn't like somebody she'd just scratch them. And if somebody was allergic to cats she'd make a beeline straight for them. It was a natural law, one of the few that she didn't break.

"Be that as it may I do wish you wouldn't fight with her so much. It just aggravates her." Kasumi said as she picked up another of her house dresses from another rack. Just because she herself didn't get involved with the madness that was the martial artists lifestyle didn't mean that her clothes were spared the same consideration.

"That girl needs to get aggravated once in a while so she can learn to control that temper of hers. It's how both Ranma and I learned." Luna said while she put her items on the counter.

"Still if she can't hit you she's going to go hit Ranma because you are his pet." Kasumi said. The young boy behind the counter suddenly perked up at this. Some kind of kinky dom game?

"I've never actually been his pet you know. It's more like the other way around. I've been his owner and keeper. He'd be dead at least 12 times over if I wasn't with him to help him out of the crap that his father got the both of us into." And she silently hoped that some of that 'crap' never dug itself out of the ground where they'd managed to burry it.

"That'll be 25,954 yen please." The young store clerk said as he imagined the older of the two wearing the fighting leathers while the younger in the Mai Shinrui costume.

"Keep the change." Luna said as she handed him a stack of bills.

The clerk tallied up the amount and found that there was easily a 4,500 yen tip. He wasn't supposed to do what he did next but she was just too cute. He grabbed one of the complimentary sets of nunchuks and placed it in the bag. They were only supposed to be given out for purchases in excess of 40,000 yen (yes this store was quite expensive) but she was worth it. When he looked up he noticed a huge foreigner enter the store.

The gaigin was easily 250 centimeters tall and had a massive chest which was quite obviously oiled up as he wasn't wearing a shirt. He was also wearing a pair of wrestling trunks and laced boots that came up to mid thigh on him. His face was concealed by a mexican wrestler mask which served to accent his dark skin. Finally there was the massive spiked mace slung across his back. The clerk just shrugged and turned back to the two lovely young ladies. It was nothing new after all as this was Nerima.

That was until he started smashing things. Then it became store business.

"I challenge all here. I is strongest!" He roared in broken and heavily accented Japanese.

The clerk jumped over the counter with the ease of a well trained martial artist and calmly walked over to where the behemoth was standing. He looked him straight in the eye and said.

"I'm sorry sir but I'm afraid I'll have to ask you to leave. The store's policy strictly states that there is to be no fighting on the premises." He said in a very calm voice. "If you wish to resist I am authorized to remove you by force." He slipped into a strange stance that Luna had never seen before.

"Like see you try." The mountain said as he unhinged his mace and took a swing.

The clerk effortlessly dodged the attack and let loose a flurry of high speed punches and kicks aimed for all of the major vulnerable spots on the human body. The attacks all took only a few seconds. Luna was impressed. The clerk was well trained and had good form. He wasn't anywhere as good as she was of course but for a store clerk in a mall store he wasn't too bad. There was just one small problem as indicated by the way the giant smashed him aside with a massive backhand. All the fancy moves in the world won't help you if you lack the penetrating power to back them up and against this mass of muscle he just couldn't punch hard enough.

Luna and Kasumi watched as the clerk slid down the wall and ended up crumpled on the ground. The few other martial artists in the store decided that this guy needed to go down and charged him. Martial arts whining, hacky sack, frisbee and water polo went down easily. Martial arts origami managed to give him a paper cut and Martial arts flashing managed to stun him for a second or two before he too went down. Suddenly it was only Luna and Kasumi in the store. He slowly walked over and looked down at them.

"You is pretty. Me smash and make not pretty. Sorry no hard feel ok?" He said as he brought his mace around for a quick swipe.

The mace came around in a smooth arc that would position it to intersect at a right angle with logarithmic force upside Kasumi's head. She watched mesmerized by the mace traversing the distance in seemingly slow motion. She'd never been attacked before and the experience was strange to say the least. She knew that she would have no chance of dodging or blocking the attack in time so she did what was most natural. She closed her eyes and waited for the pain.

The impact was precipitated by a loud meaty thud of metal impacting flesh and bone. Since she wasn't seeing her long dead mother at the pearly gates Kasumi decided to open her eyes slowly and take a look as to the cause. The cause turned out to be a slender arm that came across her field of vision. Turning her head she noted that the slender arm terminated at a seemingly delicate hand that had stopped the forward momentum of the mace about four centimeters from her head. She turned her head the other way and saw that the arm was connected to Luna who looked like an angry cat who was going to spit fury any second now because the stupid human did something she didn't like.

Of course this was the case but that's just what she looked like.

The Mr. Machismo was dumbfounded. He could bench press SMART cars, could punch through brick as easily as paper. He was the strongest person that he knew of. Yet here was this little slip of a girl who he should have torn apart was holding back his full might with one hand and only looked to be straining a bit. He suddenly felt a chill go up his spine. Of excitement or abject terror he wasn't quite certain of yet.

"Now we've got a problem here." Luna started in a quiet voice. "The others were martial artists and could take the punishment you could dish out." She said as she calmly pushed the mace farther away from Kasumi then guided the girl behind her. "I wouldn't have even minded if you'd attacked me first as I would have put you down. But no you had to go and attack Kasumi. I happen to like her as she makes great food, she puts my pillow out in the sun just the way I like it, and she pets like nobody's business! You dun fucked up NOW!" She finished as she pushed hard on the mace and followed up with an inverted mule kick which caught the man under the chin launching him into the hall and sending him crashing into the support post.

Before he even had a chance to recover she was in his face literally with her fists which then launched him down the corridor and into a bench. Shoppers were treated to the sight of a girl running on all fours like an animal towards a human mountain that was now struggling to his feet. They watched as the small girl proceeded to uppercut the huge man straight through the roof to one of the higher levels and then jump up after him. They then watched and scrambled out of the way as she hammered him back down to the fourth floor. They saw him struggle to his feet as the girl ran into the local mallet shop and come out with a huge mallet that looked like it would hurt quite a bit if somebody were hit with it. Mothers covered their children's eyes as what happened next.

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As they arrived home Kasumi looking haggard and Luna grinning from ear to ear. Both of them were carrying many bags full of stuff. As they got through the door Kasumi dropped what she was carrying and immediately went to the kitchen without bothering to take off her outside shoes. Ranma who was sitting on the ground watching Bleach at the time looked up to see Luna surrounded by lots of packages. His eye twitched as he imagined exactly how she got them. He then watched as Kasumi came out of the kitchen with a glass of hot water and proceeded to dump it over Luna's head. She then reached into the dress and pulled out a confused looking Luna. She walked over and dropped her into his lap.

"Ranma from now on she's your responsibility." Kasumi said curtly and then walked away.

Ranma looked at Luna and she looked back at him.

"What did you do now?" Ranma asked as he started automatically petting Luna.

"I didn't know she'd get so worked up about being banned for life from the Miramachi shopping arcade. I did save her life after all." Luna huffed. She thought she'd held back too.

"You've got some splaining to do."

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Back at the shopping arcade the firefighters had just gotten the last fire under control. The engineers and contractors that had been sent out from the insurance agency had deemed the building still mostly sound. And finally in the security office there were three Polaroids. The first was of a distraught Kasumi with her hair in a mess looking for all the world like she was about to be executed. The second was of a young black haired girl smiling and giving the victory sign to the camera. The third was of a black and blue man that looked more or less like he'd been put through a thresher on nitrous.

Under each picture was their names and in big red letters "BANNED".

Authors notes:

Here is another chapter of Lunocracy I'm really having fun with this story. Next up. Hmm probably dragons bane. (Sorry cat's Tale fans I may be killing the story as i just can't muster the will to do any more. If you want to take the reigns drop me a line and I'll tell you what I've got for ideas.)

Again thanks go to my pre readers without


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